7- 


Columbia  ^Hnibersiit? 
in  tt)E  €it^  of  i^trj  ^orfe 

CoOese  of  S^fi^aimni  anb  ^urseons; 


T^m 


^Reference  JLihvavy 


.^d^' 


THE   DON   QUIXOTE   OF  PSYCHIATRY 


The  Medico-Historical  Writings 

of  Victor  Robinson,  ph.c,  m.d. 

AN  ESSAY  ON  HASHEESH 

An  historical  and  pharmacological  study  of 
Cannabis  Indica,  including  observations  and 
experiments.     Published,  1912. 

PATHFINDERS  IN  MEDICINE 

Biographic  sketches  of  Galen,  Aretseus,  Paracelsus, 
Servetus,  Vesalius,  Par5,  Scheele,  Cavendish, 
Himter,  Jenner,  Laennec,  Simpson,  Semmelweis, 
Schleiden  and  Schwann,  Darwin.  Published, 
1912. 

ESSAYS  IN  MEDICAL  HISTORY 

Landmarks  in  Pharmacology,  The  Children  s 
Plague,  Atitobiography  of  the  Tubercle  Bacillus, 
and  several  other  medico-historical  articles 
published  in  volumes  xxii-xxiii  of  the  'Medical 
Review  of  Reviews,'  which  the  author  edited 
during  1916-17. 

THE  DON  QUIXOTE  OF  PSYCHIATRY 

A  chapter  in  the  history  of  American  medicine, 
containing  information  not  elsewhere  available. 
Published,  1919. 

In  Preparation 

HISTORY  OF  GONORRHEA 

From  the  earliest  time  to  the  present,  based 
largely  upon  the  original  sources. 


THE  DON  QUIXOTE  OF  PSYCHIATRY 


By 
Victor  Robinson 


NEW  YORK 

HISTORICO-MEDICAL  PRESS 

ie06  BROADWAY 

1919 


Copyright,  1919,  by 
Medical  Review  of  Reviews 


Press  of  J.  J.  Little  &  Ives  Co..  New  York 


TO  A.  LEVINSON, 

CHICAGO 

Dear  Doctor: 

In  the  year  that  Dr  Clevenger  was  ap- 
pointed to  the  staff  of  the  Michael  Reese 
Hospital,  you  and  I  were  born.  The  snows 
and  saffrons  of  more  than  thirty  years  have 
passed  since  then,  and  Dr  Clevenger  no 
longer  walks  among  the  wards  of  the  Michael 
Reese — but  you  do.  I  have  often  told  you 
fragments  of  the  tale  of  your  predecessor; 
take  now  the  finished  story  from 

Your  friend, 

The    Author. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTEH  PAGE 

I    The  Formative  Years 11 

II    At  the  Chicago  Medical  College      .      .  30 

III  Medicine  Under  King  Mike     ....  59 

IV  The  Kankakee  Affair 100 

V    Dreaming  and  Drifting 123 

VI    Books  and  Essays 143 

VII    The  Philadelphia  Group 203 

VIII    Friends  in  New  York 254 

IX    Letters  from  Spitzka 280 

X    The  Closing  Years 317 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


S.  V.  Clevengrr,  portrait 

William  E.  Quine,  portrait  and  autograph    . 

Robert  L.  Rea,  portrait  and  autograph    . 

William  H.  Byford,  portrait  and  autograph 

James  S.  Jewell,  letter  to  J.  J.  Putnam  . 

HosMER  A,  Johnson,  portrait  and  autograph 

Nathan  Smith  Davis,  portrait  and  autograph 

S.  V.  Clevenger,  portrait  .... 

S.  V.  Clevenger,  portrait  .... 

Medical  Staff  at  Kankakee,  autographs 

Clevenger's  Cottage  at  Kankakee    . 

Horatio  C.  Wood,  letter  to  Clevenger  . 

Clevenger  Book  Typewriter 

Charles  Hamilton  Hughes,  portrait 

John  Eric  Erichsen,  letter  to  Clevenger 

William  Francis  Waugh,  portrait  and  autograph 

Joseph  Leidy,  portrait  . 

Edward  D.  Cope,  portrait  . 

Joseph  LeConte,  portrait  . 

E.  D.  Cope,  letter  to  Clevenger  . 

William  Pepper,  letter  to  Cope 

William  Pepper,  portrait  . 

RoswELL  Park,  announcement 

7 


PAGE 

28 

36 

38 

42 

45 

46 

52 

98 

98 

111 

116 

129 

133 

166 

177 

184 

212 

234 

234 

239 

243 

248 

258 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

William  A.  Hammond,  letter  to  Clevenger       .      .      .  262 

William  A.  Hammond,  portrait  and  autograph    .      .  270 

Burt  G.  Wilder,  card  to  Clevenger 274 

Edward  C.  Spitzka,  portrait 284 

Burt  G.  Wilder,  portrait 284 

E.  C.  Spitzka,  letter  to  Clevenger 291 

S.  V.  Clevenger,  portrait  and  autograph       .      .      .  324 


THE  DON  QUIXOTE  OF  PSYCHIATRY 


THE  DON  QUIXOTE  OF 
PSYCHIATRY 


THE  FORMATIVE  YEARS 

HAVE  you  ever  heard  of  Dunning?  That's 
the  town,  seven  miles  from  Chicago's  cen- 
ter, where  the  Insane  Asylum  of  Cook  County 
is  located.  Had  you  lived  there  in  1880,  when 
Dunning  was  only  a  patch  of  prairie,  with 
nothing  but  the  asylum  and  some  saloons  to  indi- 
cate that  civilization  had  reached  the  spot,  you 
would  often  have  noticed  a  person  walking  along 
the  road,  holding  in  his  hand  a  tightly-closed 
tin-bucket  on  which  the  sun  glittered.  He 
seemed  to  be  a  friendly  sort  of  man,  and  ac- 
quaintances who  passed  him,  called  out,  'Hello, 
Doc'  As  he  was  not  far  from  forty  years  of 
age,  you  might  have  supposed  that  he  had  been 
practising  for  some  time,  but  your  name  is  not 
Sherlock  Holmes,  for  S.  V.  Clevenger  was  an 

M.D.  of  only  one  year's  standing. 

11 


12         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

There  had  been  too  many  cross-roads  in  his 
journey  to  enable  him  to  reach  his  destination 
sooner.  His  adventures  began  with  his  birth,  for 
altho  springing  from  strictly  American  stock — 
in  1690  John  Cle^^nger  signed  a  petition  to  the 
king  'for  better  government  of  East  Jersey,' 
and  during  the  Revolution  Captain  Job  Clev- 
ENGER  of  the  Burlington  Mihtia  was  killed  by 
the  British  at  Crosswicks,  while  his  mother's  fam- 
ily was  related  to  bold  John  Hancock — yet  he 
himself  drew  the  first  breath  of  life  beneath  the 
bluer  skies  of  Florence. 

His  father  had  worked  in  Cincinnati  as  a 
stone-cutter — until  the  day  that  he  chiseled  a 
man's  head  in  a  rock  and  all  the  city  recognized 
the  editor  of  the  Cincinnati  Evening-Post.  The 
stone-cutter  had  grown  into  a  sculptor,  and  the 
workingjman's  quarry-yard  became  an  artist's 
studio.  He  traveled  to  other  cities,  to  see  who 
would  trade  gold  for  marble.  Memorable  men 
sought  this  gifted  boy:  two  presidents  of  the 
United  States,  William  Henry  Harrison  and 
Martin  Van  Buren,  and  the  best-known  states- 
men of  the  day,  Daniel  Webster^  Henry  Clay 
and  Edw^ard  Everett,  were  among  his  sitters. 
Old  Judge  HoPKiNsoN  who  signed  the  Declara- 
tion of  Independence,  young  Julia  Ward  the 


The  Formative  Years  18 

poetess,  Washington  Aixston  the  painter,  and 
John  Eberle  the  physieian  who  helped  to  found 
the  Jefferson  Medical  College,  were  featured  for 
futurity  by  his  chisel. 

There  came  into  his  life  the  call  of  Italy,  and 
with  his  family  he  sailed  for  the  artist's  Holy 
Land — and  by  the  Arno,  on  the  twenty-fourth 
of  March,  1843,  Shobal  Vail  Clevenger,  Jr, 
came  into  the  world.  The  sculptor  toiled  hard 
and  learnt  much,  and  when  the  time  came  for 
him  to  exhibit  his  handiwork,  it  was  found  he 
had  not  carved  a  worn-out  Roman  theme,  but 
the  first  distinctive  American  figure  done  abroad 
— the  Indian.  But  what  has  become  of  this  In- 
dian no  man  knows;  he  seems  to  have  disap- 
peared like  the  living  members  of  his  race. 

Only  thirty  years  of  age,  his  genius  recognized, 
his  fame  increasing,  full  of  plans,  mapping  out 
his  work,  the  future  beckoned  brightly  to  the 
sculptor.  But  that  same  enemy  which  wrote 
Finis  to  the  poems  of  Keats,  and  hushed  the 
music  of  Chopin,  was  already  shaking  the 
plaster  from  Clevenger's  hand.  Tuberculosis 
marked  him,  and  the  stricken  youth  prepared  to 
return  to  America — to  die  at  home.  Whatever 
we  are,  wherever  we  are,  when  the  final  summons 
comes,  we  want  to  die  at  home. 


14         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

A  ship  passed  Gibraltar  with  furled  sails,  for 
a  passenger  had  died  on  the  boat,  and  lay  draped 
in  the  American  flag.  The  captain  read  the 
burial  service,  and  when  he  reached  the  words, 
'We  consign  his  body  to  the  deep,'  a  board  was 
lifted,  and  the  corpse  of  Clevenger  slid  into  the 
waters  of  the  Atlantic.  He  had  a  grave  to  which 
his  widow  could  bring  no  flowers.  Only  Junior 
did  not  weep,  for  he  was  six  months  old,  and 
did  not  understand  that  he  had  lost  a  brilliant 
father. 

When  the  widow  arrived  in  New  York,  John 
Jacob  Astor^  the  founder  of  Astoria,  advised 
her  in  disposing  of  the  statuary  that  had  caused 
the  vessel  to  dip  below  Plimsoll's  mark.  Henry 
Clay  also  called  in  reference  to  the  bust  that  he 
had  ordered,  and  when  the  tall  orator  bent  over 
to  shake  hands  with  Shobal's  little  sister,  she 
mistook  him  for  a  giant  stepping  out  of  one  of 
her  fairy-tales.  Shobal  himself  stared  at  the 
man  who  claimed  he  would  rather  be  right  than 
president,  but  only  said  'Boo,' — perhaps  he 
didn't  believe  him,  even  then.  Years  later,  the 
government  used  Clevenger's  Webster  for  its 
fifteen-cent  postage-stamp,  and  today  his  mar- 
bles are  found  in  the  Boston  Atheneeum,  in  the 
Academy  of  Fine  Arts  at  Philadelphia,  and  at 


The  Formative  Years  15 

the  Metropolitan  Museum  of  Art  in  New  York 
City.  The  builder  was  frail,  and  his  body  fed 
the  fishes,  but  his  work  shall  not  perish. 

The  Clevengeks  had  relatives  along  the  Mis- 
sissippi, and  there  they  went.  Matters  were 
talked  over,  and  it  was  decided  that  Mrs 
Clevenger  should  open  a  fashionable  hotel — a 
high-class  boarding  house  it  really  was.  To  re- 
main a  widow  when  you  are  young,  and  have 
three  children  and  an  hotel  on  your  hands,  is 
not  always  convenient,  especially  if  the  hand- 
some star-boarder  is  importunate,  and  before  long 
Mrs  Clevenger  became  Mrs  Thwinq,  and  the 
three  children — thru  no  merit  of  their  own — ac- 
quired a  step-father,  while  the  hotel  gained  a  new 
manager. 

The  second  husband  showed  marked  ability  in 
spending  the  first  husband's  money,  but  other- 
wise he  was  not  talented.  He  was  a  Southern 
gentleman,  and  in  those  days  Southern  gentle- 
men did  not  work.  Altogether,  Mr  Thwing 
failed  to  play  an  important  role  in  the  lives  of 
the  family,  for  not  many  years  later  he  too  was 
silenced  by  the  Captain  of  the  ]Men  of  Death,  as 
John  Bunyan  quaintly  called  tuberculosis. 

So  Shobal  grew  up  in  the  West.  It  was  not 
the  West  that  Daniel  Boone  and  Davy  Crock- 


16         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ETT  knew,  for  a  changing  land  was  growing  out 
of  the  broadened  trails,  already  treading  on 
the  trader's  and  the  trapper's  heel;  yet  it  was 
far  from  the  decorous  West  of  the  present,  where 
Pullman  berths  are  more  plentiful  than  wig- 
wams; it  was  the  West  raw  from  the  broad-ax, 
the  strange  territory  where  the  express  receipts 
of  Wells  &  Fargo  read:  'This  company  will  not 
be  responsible  for  the  acts  of  God,  Indians,  or 
other  public  enemies  of  the  government.' 

The  boy  never  met  God  out  west,  but  he  saw 
the  redskins,  naked  and  hostile  in  the  wild  woods ; 
he  looked  upon  the  corpses  of  men  swinging 
from  lodge-poles,  the  words  Vigilance  Commit- 
tee pinned  upon  their  last  suit  of  clothes ;  he  felt 
the  earth  tremble  beneath  a  herd  of  buffaloes 
that  stretched  for  miles;  he  lived  next  door  to 
people  who  had  played  their  parts  in  the  great 
Western  drama:  first  a  forest,  then  a  pioneer, 
then  a  clearing,  then  a  log-cabin,  then  a  massa- 
cre, and  when  the  hills  no  longer  re-echoed  the 
war-whoop,  nothing — until  the  next  settler's  fam- 
ily stepped  out  of  the  prairie-schooner. 

Shobal  Clevenger^s  earliest  recollections 
date  from  an  Indian  trading-village  which  has 
since  become  St  Louis.  Small  as  it  was,  it  sur- 
passed all  its  neighbors,  and  even  boasted  of 


The  Formative  Years  17 

traveling  salesmen.  One  of  these  drummers  had 
occasion  to  visit  a  town  that  was  springing  up 
along  Lake  Michigan,  with  the  result  that  when 
he  got  back,  he  amused  his  friends  by  telling 
them,  'That  dirty  little  mud-hole  of  Chicago  ex- 
pects to  equal  our  city  some  day.'  Here  we  have 
evidence  that  even  a  traveling  salesman's  judg- 
ment may  be  at  fault. 

Shobal  next  found  himself  on  a  farm  in  Ohio, 
where  his  big  brother  Albert  took  him  rabbit- 
hunting,  and  allowed  him  to  watch  as  he  chopped 
down  the  trees,  to  the  whistled  tune  of  a  popular 
song. 

They  went  to  Alabama  for  a  short  time,  soon 
coming  to  New  Orleans.  Here  Shobal  was 
sent  to  school,  and  found  that  the  principal  part 
of  the  curriculum  consisted  in  chastisement.  Yet 
mischievous  as  he  was,  his  own  hide  never  felt 
the  rattan,  for  when  a  good-natured  gi-in  on  his 
face  caused  him  to  be  called  forward  to  receive 
a  licking,  he  jimiped  out  of  the  window  and  never 
returned. 

To  beat  children  was  quite  the  thing  in  those 
days — it  had  Solomon's  sanction.  It  is  not  on 
record  that  Solomon  has  revised  his  maxims,  but 
it  is  evident  that  we  have  revised  our  opmion  of 
Solomon.     The  constant  whippings  brutalized 


18         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

the  youngsters,  and  certainly  aroused  sadistic 
instincts  in  the  teachers. 

Yet  the  chief  grief  of  Shobal's  childhood  was 
not  due  to  a  school-master — when  punishment 
was  imminent  he  graduated  rapidly — but  to  his 
own  mother.  She  had  bought  him  his  fii*st  pair 
of  pants,  and  like  a  true  youngster  he  had  spoiled 
the  precious  garment  by  sitting  on  a  wet  lawn. 
'That  settles  it,'  she  remarked  as  she  changed 
him  back  to  frocks,  'you.  will  have  to  wear  petti- 
coats as  long  as  you  live.'  He  was  an  impres- 
sionable lad,  and  the  picture  of  himself  grown  to 
tall  manhood,  with  long  legs  imperfectly  covered 
by  short  gowns,  disturbed  his  sleep  for  several 
nights. 

The  family  liked  New  Orleans,  but  in  1853 
came  the  yellow  fever.  It  proved  to  be  an  his- 
toric plague,  and  the  stolid  cry  of  strangers, 
'Bring  out  your  dead,  bring  out  your  dead,'  be- 
came as  common  as  when  Benjamin  Rush 
waded  thru  the  remains  of  stricken  Philadelphia, 
stopping  in  amazement  when  he  saw  some  one 
building  a  house  for  the  living  in  the  city  of  the 
dead.  All  the  Clevengers  were  attacked, 
Albert  worst  of  all.  The  remarkable  physi- 
cian, JosiAH  Clark  Nott, — who  even  in  that 
day  believed  in  the  mosquito-theory  of  yellow- 


The  Formative  Years  19 

fever,  but  died  before  any  one  else  believed  it — 
treated  the  sufferers,  and  left  special  orders  in 
regard  to  Albert.  Nurses  have  disobeyed  phy- 
sicians— with  resulting  benefit  to  the  patients — 
but  it  was  not  thus  in  this  case:  as  soon  as  Dr 
Nott's  back  was  turned,  the  nurse  did  just  what 
he  told  her  not  to  do,  and  in  a  few  hours  there 
was  one  Clevenger  less  in  the  world. 

Shobal  went  back  to  St  Louis,  alone  this 
time,  as  he  was  already  twelve  years  old;  first 
he  worked  as  a  clerk  in  his  Uncle  Yates'  boat 
store,  then  another  relative,  John  J.  Roe,  the 
merchant  prince  of  St  Louis,  put  him  in  the 
States  Savings  Institution  as  a  messenger,  and 
he  was  soon  promoted  to  a  collectorship.  It  was 
the  largest  bank  in  the  west,  there  were  no  clear- 
ing houses  then,  and  some  days  he  collected  over 
a  million  dollars  in  gold  and  silver,  but  he  evened 
up  matters  by  seeing  little  money  since.  It  was 
often  necessary  to  take  trips  down  the  river,  and 
he  remembered  at  least  one  of  the  cub  pilots,  as 
he  happened  to  be  Mark  Tw^ain. 

The  California  fever  heated  the  young  man's 
blood,  but  because  of  Indians  on  the  war-path  he 
was  switched  to  Colorado  and  New  INIexico.  As 
indicative  of  the  types  that  one  was  likely  to  meet 
in  those  days,  let  it  be  mentioned  that  at  Pike's 


20         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Peak  he  came  across  Pat  Casey,  a  rich  mine 
owner  who  could  not  sign  his  name,  but  who 
could  pay  $300  for  a  night's  use  of  the  bridal 
chamber  in  a  New  York  hotel,  sleeping  alone  in 
the  gorgeous  bed  with  his  boots  on. 

Shobal  remained  an  inhabitant  of  St  Louis 
until  the  lowering  war-clouds  broke  into  a  red 
outpour.  It  became  plain  that  Henry  Clay's 
compromises  had  effected  nothing;  nor  indeed 
was  any  concession  possible  with  a  people  whose 
leading  newspapers  uttered  sentiments  such  as 
these : 

'Free  Society!'  cried  the  Muscogee  Herald  of 
Alabama,  'we  sicken  at  the  name.  What  is  it 
but  a  conglomeration  of  greasy  workmen,  filthy 
operatives,  and  small-fisted  farmers?  All  the 
Northern  States  are  devoid  of  society  fitted  for 
a  well-bred  gentleman.  The  prevailing  class  is 
that  of  mechanics  struggling  to  be  genteel,  and 
small  farmers  who  do  their  own  drudgery  and 
are  not  fit  for  association  with  a  gentleman's 
body-servant.' 

'The  establishment  of  the  Confederacy,'  ex- 
plained the  Richmond  Enquirer  of  Tennessee, 
'is  a  distinct  reaction  against  the  whole  course  of 
the  mistaken  civilization  of  the  age.  For  liberty, 
equality,  fraternity,  we  have  deliberately  substi- 


The  Formative  Years  21 

tilted  slave  labor;  for  voluntary  labor,  the  Con- 
federacy has  substituted  involuntary  labor;  for 
paid  labor,  the  Confederacy  has  su])stituted  un- 
paid labor.' 

'There  are  slave  races  born  to  labor,'  pro- 
claimed the  Jiichvicmd  Eocaminer,  'and  master 
races  born  to  govern  and  control  the  fruits  of 
labor.' 

One  portion  of  the  community  was  to  drudge 
and  be  common,  and  the  other  portion  was  to 
reap  the  benefits  and  be  gentlemen — such  was 
the  creed  of  these  high-toned  highwaymen.  The 
arch-southron,  proprietor  of  negroes  and  father 
of  mulattoes, — a  gentleman  of  such  exquisite 
sensibilities  that  he  was  quite  capable  of  selling 
his  own  children  into  slavery — needed  a  national 
disaster  to  convince  him  that  he  was  out  of  place 
in  the  nineteenth  century. 

When  the  call  for  volunteers  came,  Shobal 
Clevenger^  a  splendid  youth  of  nineteen,  en- 
listed as  a  private  in  a  regiment  being  raised  in 
Kansas  City.  During  the  course  of  the  war  he 
was  in  the  armies  commanded  by  Grant,  Fre- 
mont, Howard,  the  lamented  McPherson,  and 
Thomas. 

At  Nashville,  Tennessee,  he  joined  the  United 
States  Engineer   Corps,   and  was   occupied  in 


22         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

building  bridges  and  railroads.  Here  he  met 
Miss  Mariana  Knapp,  a  graduate  of  the  West- 
em  Female  College  of  Oxford,  Ohio;  after  that, 
whenever  he  marched  off  with  the  troops,  and 
the  regimental  musicians  played,  'The  Girl  I 
Left  Behind  Me,'  Shobal  had  something  to 
think  about.  Altho  we  find  no  date  attached, 
we  opine  that  it  was  around  this  time  that  he 
wrote  the  Invocation  containing  the  lines : 

Help  me,  O  muse,  to  sing  her  praise, 

Mark  with  me  all  her  gentle  ways ; 

Her  sylphid  form,  her  deep  blue  eye 

That  purity  of  soul  imply — 

Her  easy,  unassuming  grace, 

Jler  modest,  lovely,  downcast  face,  etc. 

Private  Clevenger  joined  Sherman  when 
that  doughty  General  started  on  his  journey  to 
the  sea,  but  he  was  turned  back  by  the  order  of 
Andrew  Johnson,  military  governor  of  the 
state,  who  promoted  him  to  a  first  lieutenantcy 
in  the  Tenth  Tennessee  Infantry,  and  placed 
him  in  charge  of  Sherman  Barracks,  with  the 
additional  privilege  of  raising  a  battalion  of  his 
own.  So  while  Sherman  was  marching  thru 
Georgia,  Clevenger  was  inserting  patriotic  ad- 
vertisements in  the  newspapers,  under  the  title, 


The  Formative  Years  28 

'To  the  Truly  Loyal,'  urging  all  able-bodied 
males  to  enlist  under  his  new  lieutenant's  sword. 
Most  participants  in  the  Civil  War  have 
talked  about  it  for  the  remainder  of  their  lives — 
the  veteran  winning  battles  with  his  tongue  and 
cane  has  been  a  familiar  figure  in  American  life 
since  the  sixties — but  Clevenger  rarely  alluded 
to  his  martial  exploits,  altho  his  career  in  the 
army  was  honorable  and  hazardous.  He  per- 
formed his  duty  and  volunteered  for  more,  as 
may  be  seen  by  the  characteristic  note  which  he 
sent  to  the  commander  of  the  post  at  Johnson- 
ville : 

I  have  the  honor  to  request  the  privilege  of  taking  15 
of  my  men  out  on  a  scout  across  the  Tennessee.  Hav- 
ing experience,  and  experienced  men  who  know  the  coun- 
try thoroly,  I  might  be  enabled  to  do  much  service  by 
being  permitted  to  scout  tomorrow. 

Hoping  that  my  request  will  be  granted,  your  ac- 
quiescence will  find  me  at  your  headquarters  tomorrow. 

Special  order  1721,  directing  Lieutenant 
Clevenger  to  report  with  twenty-five  men  at 
Picket  Post  to  escort  a  quarter-master  train 
twelve  miles  out,  was  signed  by  Andrew  John- 
son— and  it  certainly  looks  like  the  chirography 
of  a  man  who  couldn't  write  until  his  wife  taught 


24         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

him.  In  the  remarks  on  the  muster-out  arolll 
that  lies  before  us,  it  is  stated  that  Clevenger 
served  in  four  regiments  and  commanded  one; 
that  he  was  Captain  by  appointment,  but  was 
not  mustered  in;  and  that  in  December,  1864,  for 
his  services  at  the  Battle  of  Nashville,  he  was 
appointed  Brevet  Lieutenant  Colonel  by  An- 
drew Johnson — presidential  approval  pending. 
When  the  time  for  ratification  arrived,  Johnson 
himself  was  the  man  in  the  White  House,  but 
he  was  so  occupied  with  the  terrible  Stanton 
that  he  forgot  the  Battle  of  Nashville  and  neg- 
lected to  approve  his  own  appointment.  So 
Clevenger  remained  only  a  lieutenant. 

When  the  war  was  over,  he  became  chief  clerk 
in  a  claim  agency,  and  helped  to  muster  the  boys 
in  blue  out  of  service,  an  occupation  in  which  he 
earned  considerable  money.  By  this  time  Miss 
Knapp  was  his  wife,  and  together  they  started 
for  Montana — accompanied  by  the  books  that 
had  been  used  at  the  Western  Female  College; 
Mrs  Clevenger  didn't  need  them  any  more,  but 
Clevenger  did:  he  wanted  an  education  too. 

It  took  ninety  days  to  reach  Montana,  but 
when  they  were  settled,  they  became  personages 
in  the  land:  at  White  Tail  Deer,  Clevenger  held 
the  office  of  justice  of  the  peace,  and  at  Fort 


The  Formative  Years  25 

Benton,  Mrs  Clevenqer  organized  the  first  pub- 
lic school,  while  her  husky  mate  was  hotel  keeper, 
probate  judge,  court  commissioner,  and  revenue 
collector.  Besides,  he  made  meteorological  ob- 
servations for  the  Smithsonian  Institution,  with 
rain-gauges  furnished  by  Joseph  Henry  him- 
self. 

As  a  worker  for  Uncle  Sam  it  was  one  of 
Clevenger's  jobs  to  look  after  the  illegal  whisky 
that  the  white  men  were  selling  to  the  Indians — 
really  mixtures  of  chemicals  with  tobacco  juice, 
red  pepper  and  fusel-oil  in  spirits  of  cologne — 
and  he  had  the  sport  of  emptying  hundreds  of 
such  barrels  into  the  Missouri  river,  tho  some- 
times the  trader  would  not  give  up  the  rot-gut 
whisky  until  he  found  a  file  of  soldiers  in  un- 
comfortable propinquity. 

Nature  is  a  harsh  step-mother  to  the  hmnan 
race:  if  a  man  is  syphilitic  or  has  gallstones,  his 
children  are  in  danger  of  inheriting  the  disorder, 
but  if  he  has  any  special  talent,  his  offspring 
are  not  so  liable  to  be  infected  with  it.  None  of 
the  sculptor's  childi'en  showed  any  artistic  in- 
clination, but  Shobal  was  gifted  in  another 
direction:  he  had  a  bent  toward  scientific  things. 
In  spite  of  his  official  functions,  the  long  silent 
winter-evenings  at  the  isolated  fur-post  gave  him 


26         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

leisure  to  cultivate  himself.  His  wife  was  his 
teacher,  until  he  went  beyond  her.  He  qualified 
as  a  civil  engineer,  and  soon  had  a  contract  to 
sui'vey  the  military  reservation. 

Thruout  all  his  surveys  he  carried  with  him 
the  identical  copy  of  Loomis'  Trigonometry  and 
Logarithms  which  his  wife  had  used  in  the  Ohio 
school,  but  he  carried  it  across  that  sandy  waste 
of  New  Mexico  known  as  the  Journey  of  Death, 
for  all  along  the  route  were  the  bones  of  men, 
oxen,  deer,  buffaloes,  wolves,  dogs,  horses, — 
animals  that  perished  from  want  of  water.  On 
these  surveys  he  learnt  what  it  was  to  wander  in 
a  blizzard  without  food  for  days,  and  finally  to 
cook  a  steak  from  a  government-mule  that  was 
found  frozen  on  the  ground.  He  learnt  what 
it  was  to  go  without  drink,  when  the  tongue 
hangs  out,  swollen,  blackened,  fissured,  and  a 
cracker  turns  to  dry  powder  in  the  mouth,  and 
then,  delirious  with  joy,  dash  and  roll,  with 
clothing  on,  into  a  creek  of  water.  Hunger  and 
thirst;  clouds  of  mosquitoes  and  whirlwinds  of 
sand;  storms  that  tore  his  tents  to  shreds,  and 
dust  that  blinded  the  eyes;  mountains  and 
prairies;  Indians  and  politicians:  these  obstacles 
did  not  prevent  him  from  surveying  endless  miles 
in  what  was  then  unexplored  Dakota  Territory, 


The  Formative  Years  27 

now   the   states   of   North   and   South   Dakota. 

He  did  more  for  Dakota :  he  built  its  first  tele- 
graph, thus  connecting  isolated  Yankton  with 
the  outside  world.  It  meant  much  to  the  town, 
which  now  decided  to  consider  itself  the  metropo- 
lis of  the  northwest.  The  mayor,  the  news- 
papers and  the  inhabitants  turned  out  to  wel- 
come the  builder,  a  telegraph-ball  was  given  in 
honor  of  the  thread-like  wire  which  could  carry 
Yankton's  messages  over  the  far-stretching 
prairies  into  the  busy  haunts  of  men,  and  just 
to  prove  that  everything  was  all  right,  Cleven- 
GER  played  a  game  of  chess  by  telegraph  with  an 
operator  in  Chicago. 

But  we  must  take  things  as  they  come  on  our 
planet,  and  a  few  months  after  this  triumph, 
the  Clevengers  lost  their  daughter  Bessie,  a 
child  of  five,  from  scarlatina,  and  the  world 
looked  changed  to  them.  But  men  must  work, 
tho  their  children  die,  and  as  the  Dakota 
Southern  Railway  was  being  erected,  Clevenger 
secured  the  position  of  its  chief  engineer. 

As  his  engineering  skill  increased,  his  ambi- 
tions expanded,  and  he  formed  the  project  of 
building  monuments  of  masomy  along  boundary 
lines  and  doing  such  creditable  astronomical  and 
geographical    work    that    engineers    from    afar 


28         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

would  come  to  study  it.  To  accomplish  this,  he 
calculated,  would  take  three  years  of  labor  and 
about  thirty  thousand  dollars.  To  get  such  a 
contract  it  was  necessary  to  visit  headquarters. 
He  had  another  reason  for  going — he  was  loaded 
with  evidence  against  the  Land  and  Indian  De- 
partments in  the  West,  and  if  the  government 
agents  could  be  prevented  from  robbing  the  In- 
dians of  their  annuities  and  swindling  them  to 
the  starvation  point,  there  would  be  no  more  out- 
breaks like  the  Minnesota  Massacre.  H.  H.'s 
A  Century  of  Dishonor — a  white  woman's  in- 
dictment of  white  men — is  America's  bitter 
classic. 

So  the  day  came  when  the  western  youth, 
tanned  with  the  sun  and  winds  of  Dakota, 
walked  thru  the  streets  of  the  national  capital. 
It  was  fortunate  for  Clevenger  that  he  came  to 
Washington.  He  learnt  many  things :  he  learnt 
that  no  one  wanted  to  hear  anything  in  favor  of 
monuments  of  masonry,  and  that  no  one  wanted 
to  hear  anything  against  government  agents. 

Still  he  lingered,  and  at  last  the  wheel  of  for- 
tune seemed  to  take  a  more  favorable  turn.  A 
few  Washingtonians  approached  him,  and  prom- 
ised to  obtain  the  appropriation.  Clevenger 
thanked  them  cordially.     'Provided,'  they  added, 


CLEVENGER 
During  the  Yankton  Period 


The  Formative  Years  29 

*yoii  give  us  a  certain  percentage,  ahem.'  This 
was  followed  hy  the  gentle  hint  that  he  didn't 
have  to  do  the  work  at  all — it  could  easily  he  re- 
ported that  Indians  had  destroyed  it.  vSome  one 
thought  it  time  to  take  pity  on  his  simplicity, 
and  told  him,  'Go  home,  and  I'll  give  you  a  base 
line  to  measure,  at  which  you  can  earn  an  engi- 
neer's salary,  tho  it  will  take  a  year  or  two  before 
you  can  have  it.  If  you  stay  in  Washington, 
your  political  friends  who  claim  to  be  pledged 
to  your  ideas,  will  rob  you  of  your  papers,  put 
you  in  the  wrong  and  sell  out  to  the  senators  who 
even  now  are  secretly  laughing  at  you.' 

It  was  a  sobered  engineer  who  set  his  face 
westward  again,  determined  to  survey  no  more 
land  for  the  government,  resolved  to  follow  a 
new  calling — where  politicians  could  not  enter: 
Medicine. 


II 


AT  THE  CHICAGO  MEDICAL 
COLLEGE 

AT  this  juncture,  General  Alfred  J.  Meyee, 
chief  of  the  United  States  Weather  Bu- 
reau, which  was  then  in  the  signal  service  of  the 
war  department,  requested  Clevenger  to  take 
charge  of  the  observatory  at  Fort  Sully,  Dakota, 
and  he  consented  for  the  sake  of  a  livelihood. 
His  work  consisted  in  telegraphing  three  times 
daily  to  Washington,  the  barometer  and  ther- 
mometer readings,  minimum  and  maximum  tem- 
peratures, nature  and  direction  of  clouds,  hu- 
midity and  wind  force,  translated  into  cipher. 

But  it  w^as  medicine  that  filled  his  dream,  and 
under  the  direction  of  the  army  surgeons  he  read 
the  Vienna  masters,  Rokitansky,  Skoda,  and 
Hebra — but  did  not  hear  of  Semmelweis.  He 
studied  also  anatomy  and  chemistry — preparing 
for  college.  He  sent  East  for  a  copy  of 
Holden's  Anato7ny,  and  when  it  arrived,  he  and 
Dr  Bergen,  the  post  surgeon,  pored  over  it  with 
delight — but  they  needed  a  skeleton  to  compare 

30 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         31 

with  the  beautiful  plates.  No  doubt  they  felt 
like  killing  the  post  commander — a  snob  who 
wasted  honest  men's  time  by  demanding  that 
they  perpetually  salute  him  and  dress  punctili- 
ously for  parade.  But  deciding  it  would  he 
safer  to  obtain  a  ready-made  frame-work  of  the 
human  body,  they  plamied  to  rob  an  Indian 
place  of  sepulture — across  a  ravine,  on  a  high 
bluff,  some  miles  from  the  fort. 

They  prepared  flour  sacks,  dark  lanterns  and 
revolvers — and  waited  for  night;  sliding  down 
one  hill  and  climbing  another,  they  hurried  along 
until  they  came  to  a  Sioux  village  of  teepees, 
where  many  dogs  howled.  Hiding  until  all  was 
still,  they  crept  on  again,  and  reached  the  grave- 
yard. The  bodies  were  not  buried,  but  were  in 
boxes  hanging  on  poles.  They  tumbled  these 
down,  and  after  filling  the  flour  sacks  with  bones, 
the  adventurers  returned  to  the  fort  without  inci- 
dent. 

Content  but  exhausted,  Clevenger  threw 
himself  into  bed  with  torn  clothes  and  shoes 
bristling  with  prickly  pear  stickers,  his  body 
pierced  all  over  with  cactus  spines.  He  slept. 
He  awoke  in  full  daylight  to  find  the  hospital 
steward  bending  over  him  with  a  gi'in  that  almost 
split  his  face.     The  steward  was  a  little  Yankee 


82         The  Bon  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

who  spoke  in  so  squeaky  a  voice  that  if  heard 
on  the  stage  it  would  be  considered  a  caricature. 
'Were  you  and  Dr  Bergen  poking  around  the 
Indian  burying  ground  last  night?'  he  queried. 

'Is  that  any  of  your  damned  business?'  asked 
Clevenger. 

'Not  a  bit,'  he  cried  in  delight,  'but  you  ought 
to  listen  to  the  racket  down  in  the  Indian  village. 
The  major  sent  down  to  find  out  what  was  eat- 
ing them,  and  they  said  the  spirits  of  their  dead 
friends  were  dancing  on  the  hill  last  night.  The 
major  did  some  guessing  on  his  own  account  and 
sent  for  Bergen  who  gave  the  secret  away.' 

'Well,'  answered  Clevenger,  'I  guess  we  can 
survive  the  major  knowing  that  we  are  studying 
anatomy  at  this  post.' 

'That's  all  right,'  agreed  the  steward,  'but  there 
is  more  to  tell:  that  was  a  special  grave-yard.' 

'What  sort?'  asked  Clevenger,  yawning. 
'Kings  and  queens,  chiefs  and  chief  esses?' 

'Worse  than  that:  small-pox!' 

Suddenly  Clevenger  became  interested  in  his 
surroundings,  and  with  a  leap  was  at  his  keys 
telegraphing  for  vaccine  lymph — which  came  in 
a  month.  The  small-pox,  however,  did  not  come 
at  all — the  Indians  must  have  been  hanging  a 
long  time — but  Clevenger  was  again  bitten  by 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         33 

a  political  trick:  Captain  IIowgate  boodled  so 
much  of  the  signal  service  funds  that  the  Fort 
Sully  office  was  discontinued. 

Clevenger  now  sought  employment  from  the 
owner  of  a  fleet  of  steamboats,  John  H. 
Charees,  the  same  who  advanced  the  wire  and 
expenses  for  his  telegraph,  and  was  one  of  the 
best  friends  he  ever  had.  Under  this  good- 
hearted  Commodore  he  worked  as  a  steamboat 
clerk  until  he  considered  he  had  sufficient  money 
to  go  to  medical  school. 

He  had  set  his  heart  on  Harvard,  and  was 
frank  enough  to  inform  the  Secretary  of  his  cir- 
cumstances: his  family  was  increasing,  his  in- 
come was  not.  The  Secretary  was  Reginald 
Heber  Fitz,  but  in  his  reply  of  December,  1876, 
the  investigator  of  the  intrapleural  lipomata  of 
the  mediastinum  appears  as  a  sensible  economist. 
He  explained  to  Mr  Clevenger  that  even  an 
unmarried  student  cannot  live  on  less  than  $7 
a  week,  that  the  tuition  fee  was  $200  a  year,  that 
outside  work  could  be  obtained  only  with  ex- 
treme difficulty,  and  that  such  work  was  hardly 
feasible,  as  the  college  demanded  the  student's 
entire  time.     Good-bye,  Harvard! 

The  University  of  JNIichigan  also  was  thought 
of,  but  he  finally  decided  that  the  Chicago  Med- 


34         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ical  College,  now  Northwestern  University, 
would  be  his  alma  mater.  This  was  not  the  old- 
est medical  school  in  Illinois.  In  the  early 
thirties,  when  Daniel  Brainard  was  studying 
medicine  in  Philadelphia,  Chicago  had  a  popula- 
tion of  about  one  hundred — and  all  its  mail  was 
deposited  in  a  dry-goods  box.  Yet  the  boom 
was  on,  and  in  the  fall  of  1835,  when  Dr  Brain- 
ard rode  into  Chicago  on  his  little  Indian  pony, 
he  found  a  village  of  three  thousand  inhabitants. 
The  mortar  was  already  hardening  in  Chicago's 
first  brick  building — erected  by  Gurdon  Sal- 
TONSTALL  HuBBARD  and  kuowu  as  'Hubbard's 
Folly.'  But  hogs  still  roamed  thru  the  business 
section,  and  when  it  rained  hard,  the  placard 
'No  bottom'  was  posted  near  the  chief  streets, 
and  an  old  hat  floating  with  the  warning,  'Keep 
away — I  went  down  here,'  was  a  ghastly  re- 
minder that  men  and  horses  could  drown  in  mud. 
But  Daniel  Brainard  walked  on  the  sunny 
side  of  the  street,  and  applied  to  the  legislature 
for  permission  to  open  a  medical  college.  It 
was  not  a  niggardly  legislature:  in  1837  it  sent 
Brainard  a  charter  for  his  school,  and  at  the 
same  time  sent  Chicago  a  charter  that  made  it  a 
city.  So  a  medical  college  was  founded  in 
Chicago — on  paper.     Six  years  were  to  pass  be- 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         85 

fore  Brainaiid  issued  a  four-page  leaflet,  full 
of  typographical  errors,  announcing  that  Rush 
Medical  College  was  open.  The  lectures  were 
delivered  in  the  office  of  Dr  Buainard's  wooden 
house,  the  course  lasted  sixteen  weeks,  the  fac- 
ulty consisted  of  four  men,  and  twenty-five  stu- 
dents were  present. 

What  grows  like  Chicago?  Fifteen  years 
after  this  experiment,  Rush  was  a  flourishing  in- 
stitution, with  hospital  facilities  and  famous  pro- 
fessors on  its  staff.  Brainard  himself  could  not 
keep  pace  with  some  of  the  teachers.  They  de- 
manded that  the  two  years  of  instruction  which 
the  college  was  now  giving,  be  lengthened  to 
three,  and  that  the  course  be  graded.  Brainard 
refused  to  accede  to  these  innovations;  the  man 
who  had  founded  the  first  medical  school  in 
Chicago  was  fighting  against  improved  medical 
education ;  it  is  sad  when  the  pioneer  becomes  the 
reactionary. 

But  Daniel  Brain ard's  day  had  passed:  he 
who  cannot  keep  step  with  the  world's  progress 
is  left  behind.  The  most  talented  instructors  on 
the  faculty  severed  their  comiexions  with  Rush, 
and  taking  with  them  the  clinical  service  of 
Mercy  Hospital,  the  rebels  established  in  1859 
the  rival  institution  known  as  the  Chicago  INIed- 


36         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ical  College,  and  here  it  was  that  a  bearded  Da- 
kotian  matriculated  eighteen  years  later. 

So  a  new  life  dawned  for  Cle^tenger,  bring- 
ing with  it  new  pleasures  and  new  troubles — to 
struggle  across  the  arid  wastes  of  Gray's 
Anatomy,  to  scale  its  mountains  of  technicalities, 
to  flounder  in  its  swamps  of  details,  to  be  lost 
by  lamp-light  in  its  jungle  of  terms,  was  per- 
haps as  difficult  as  surveying  a  waterless  prairie. 
But  he  was  in  no  danger  of  flunking.  He  had 
read  the  Vienna  Triumvirate,  and  the  army  sur- 
geons had  taught  him  anatomy  and  chemistry. 
As  for  materia  medica,  he  knew  it  by  rote ;  he  had 
made  the  mistake  of  thinking  it  was  necessary 
to  know  the  entire  Pharmacopeia  before  matricu- 
lating, and  with  his  usual  enthusiasm  and  ability 
he  practically  memorized  the  volume  from  cover 
to  cover;  it  is  doubtful  if  there  was  another  stu- 
dent in  the  country  who  knew  the  Fifth  Decen- 
nial Revision  of  the  U.  S.  P.  as  well  as 
Clevenger. 

At  least  one  member  of  the  faculty  was  about 
ten  years  younger  than  himself — Roswell 
Park,  the  demonstrator  of  anatomy. 

William  E.  Quine,  who  taught  materia 
medica  and  general  therapeutics,  was  not  nearly 
as  venerable  as  he  has  since  become,  but  that 


^fm.    ^    J26fm(\ 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         87 

he  was  not  too  young  is  evident  from  the  tribute 
which  Clevenger  hastily  scribbled  upon  the 
blackboard  while  the  class  was  waiting — not  too 
impatiently — for  the  professor's  appearance: 

Sound  the  stage  horn,  ring  the  cow  bell, 
That  the  waiting  world  may  know; 
Publish  it  thruout  our  borders. 
Even  unto  Mexico. 

Seize  your  pen,  Oh  dreaming  poet! 
And  in  numbers  smooth  as  may  be, 
Waft  the  joyful  tidings  round  us: 
BiLLiY  QuiNE  has  got  a  baby. 

Robert  Laughlin  Rea,  who  climbed  from 
the  plow  to  a  professor's  chair,  was  the  teacher 
of  anatomy.  It  is  something  of  a  coincidence 
that  he  had  previously  taught  at  the  school  where 
Mariana  Knapp  was  a  student.  We  may  here 
relate  the  tale  of  the  flower  of  the  Oxford  Semi- 
nary: among  Rea's  pupils  was  a  Southern  girl, 
endowed  with  intellect  and  miusual  beauty. 
Her  charms  brought  most  of  the  young  sparks 
of  the  town  to  her  feet,  and  before  her  tuition 
was  concluded,  she  was  betrothed  to  one  of  these 
gentlemen.  But  a  story  that  leaked  out  of  the 
South,  cut  the  thread  of  her  trousseau.  Her 
lover  discovered  that  she  was  not  a  white  woman, 


38         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

but  an  octoroon — and  he  promptly  disowned  her. 
The  maid  was  in  despair,  and  it  became  neces- 
sary for  her  father  to  visit  her.  Nature  is  fre- 
quently unfair;  at  the  very  moment  when  the 
father  required  all  his  resources  to  comfort  his 
lovely  but  distressed  child,  he  fell  a  victim  to 
disease.  Dr  Rea  attended  him  with  devotion, 
but  the  cholera  added  another  corpse  to  its  mil- 
lions of  victims.  The  physician,  who  was  ap- 
pointed executor  of  the  will,  conveyed  to  its 
Southern  home  the  body  that  he  could  not  save; 
then  secretly  and  successfully,  tho  at  consider- 
able personal  risk,  he  brought  back  with  him  his 
pupil's  two  sisters,  as  it  was  not  safe  for  these 
young  women  to  remain  in  that  section  of  the 
great  republic  where  a  bit  of  extra  pigment  was 
made  an  excuse  for  slavery.  The  villain  in  The 
Octoroon  was  once  well-known  in  American 
melodrama;  but  certainly  Dr  Rea  played  a 
hero's  part  in  a  real  racial  tragedy. 

Rea  was  regarded  by  many  of  his  colleagues 
as  the  greatest  anatomist  that  Chicago  had  pro- 
duced, but  he  was  not  a  research  worker.  He 
seems  to  have  been  a  master  of  his  subject,  altho 
he  did  not  specialize  in  anatomy — he  owned  busi- 
ness blocks  on  Monroe  Street.  We  understand 
Rea  was  the  first  to  point  out  that  Rembrandt's 


At  the  CJdcago  Medical  College         39 

Anatomy  at  the  Hague,  where  Nicholas  van 
TuLPius  demonstrates  a  disseetion  to  a  ^uild  of 
Amsterdam  surgeons,  eontains  the  mistake  of 
representing  the  flexor  siiblimis  digitorum  as 
originating  from  the  outer  instead  of  the  inner 
side  of  the  arm. 

While  Rea  divided  his  affections  equally  be- 
tween money  and  medicine,  Ralph  N.  Isham 
let  the  scales  tip  low  to  the  side  of  cash.  He 
went  thru  college  at  the  expense  of  a  medical 
friend,  and  refused  to  return  the  loan  until  the 
exasperated  doctor  drew  a  revolver  upon  him. 
Isham's  greed  was  such  that  he  did  not  interfere 
when  his  own  father  was  sent  to  the  poor-house. 
Isham  married  an  albino — she  had  no  color  in 
her  iris,  but  she  had  green  and  yellow  at  the 
banko  These  hateful  qualities  did  not  prevent 
Dr  Isham  from  being  an  accomplished  surgeon 
and  an  entertaining  teacher.  Nature  often  puts 
talents  into  the  wrong  hands.  Railroads  need 
men  with  hearts  of  steel,  and  Ralph  N.  Isham 
was  chief  surgeon  of  the  C.  &  N.  W.  R.  R.  In 
swearing  to  anything  that  would  aid  the  road 
lawyers  against  injured  cases,  he  proved  himself 
unscrupulous. 

But  Cle^tenger's  pet  aversion  on  the  faculty 
was  John  H.  Hollister,  the  secretary  of  the 


40         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

school,  and  professor  of  pathology.  Hollister 
was  undoubtedly  one  of  the  most  religious  physi- 
cians in  Chicago:  even  in  ordinary  conversation 
he  would  fold  his  hands  prayerfully  and  roll  the 
whites  of  his  eyes  heavenward;  if  patients  were 
willing,  he  would  kneel  at  their  bedside  and  pray 
for  them,  and  from  Sunday-school  pulpits  he 
would  relate  how  he  and  God  cured  the  sick — 
tho  it  was  common  knowledge  among  his  con- 
freres that  he  would  desert  critical  cases  at  crit- 
ical times.  His  love  of  Christ  was  surpassed 
only  by  his  love  of  Coin.  He  was  a  poor  pathol- 
ogist— his  duties  to  the  Lord  left  him  no  leisure 
to  enter  his  laboratory.  He  was  so  occupied 
with  studying  Isaiah^  he  had  no  opportunity  to 
read  Rokitansky.  As  a  lecturer  he  was  inco- 
herent, 'usually  beginning  with  the  therapeusis 
of  the  aurora  borealis  and  winding  up  with  spec- 
ulations upon  the  climatology  of  hades.'  It  was 
said  that  if  Hollistee  should  be  examined  by  a 
state  board  for  qualification  as  a  practitioner,  his 
rating  would  be  as  follows:  anatomy,  0;  chem- 
istry, 0 ;  materia  medica,  0 ;  medicine,  0 ;  surgery, 
0;  piety,  105. 

A  man  of  an  entirely  different  stamp  was 
Edmund  Andrews,  the  professor  of  surgery, 
Wholesome,     kindly,     talented,     he     was     the 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         41 

Rabelais  of  the  faculty  in  his  love  of  hurnor — 
altho  an  active  supporter  of  the  Presbyterian 
Church — and  his  laugh  was  infectious.  Many 
a  college  quiz  and  clinic  were  enlivened  by  his 
gaynesso  'Mr  Hayes,'  he  asked,  'what  would 
you  do  in  case  of  post-partum  hemorrhage?' 
'I  would  tie  the  post-partum  artery,'  bluffed  the 
student.  When  old  Andrews  heard  that,  he 
stood  on  one  leg  and  laughed,  and  when  he  got 
tired,  he  stood  on  the  other  leg  and  laughed — 
and  all  the  boys  laughed  with  him. 

Andrews  rose  from  a  farm-hand  to  the  leader- 
ship of  the  surgical  profession  in  the  mid-west. 
American  medicine  can  tell  of  many  lads  who 
were  once  forced  to  cut  grass,  but  later  gained 
permission  to  place  their  knives  in  human  flesh. 
Andrew^s  began  the  study  of  medicine  under 
ZiNA  Pitcher — a  name  that  is  heard  no  more, 
but  there  was  a  day  when  fossils  and  plants  were 
named  after  Zina  Pitcher,  and  he  was  elected 
president  of  the  American  Medical  Association. 
Pitcher  had  been  a  surgeon  in  the  war  of  1812, 
and  his  pupil  rendered  similar  service  in  the  war 
of  the  sixties.  Later,  Andrews  organized  state 
societies,  scientific  academies,  journals  and  medi- 
cal colleges.  He  wrote  much,  but  better  even 
than  his  text-book  was  his  warm  nature,  which 


42         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

shone  thru  every  pore  of  his  benevolent  face,  with 
its  halo  of  snow-white  beard. 

William  Heath  Byfokd — a  mechanic's  son 
and  tailor's  apprentice — was  one  of  the  original 
seceders  from  Rush,  and  occupied  the  chair  of 
gynecology.  He  was  also  a  founder  of  the 
Women's  Medical  College,  and  he  lectured  there 
for  years,  as  he  was  a  most  enthusiastic  advocate 
of  medical  education  for  women. 

The  history  of  medicine  is  strewn  with  blun- 
ders, but  they  cluster  thickest  on  the  gynecologic 
branch.  Time  can  never  cleanse  the  dark  pages 
that  tell  the  story  of  puerperal  fever.  When  we 
were  a  bit  younger,  every  hospital  collected 
bushels  of  ovaries  that  should  have  been  left  in 
the  pelvic  cavity.  In  Byford's  day,  lacerated 
cervices  with  everted  mucous  surfaces  were  mis- 
taken for  ulcers,  and  accordingly  cauterized. 
But  Marion  Sims'  assistant,  Thomas  Addis 
Emmet^  sewed  them  up — trachelorrhaphy — ^be- 
coming famous,  while  Byford  publicly  acknowl- 
edged that  he  had  committed  thousands  of  these 
errors.  He  likewise  told  of  taking  a  country 
doctor's  diagnosis  of  cystic  tumor ;  so  Byford  cut 
into  the  abdomen,  and  instead  of  a  cystic  tumor 
he  beheld  a  gravid  uterus — but  that's  an  old 
story. 


/#V//L/^^ 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         48 

No  man  advertises  his  mistakes,  unless  he  has 
virtues  to  match.  Byford  could  afford  to  point 
out  his  own  shortcomings,  because  before  Law- 
son  Tait  he  advocated  laparotomy  for  ruptured 
extra-uterine  pregnancy;  he  championed  the 
slippery  elm  tent,  and  was  among  the  earliest  to 
employ  ergot  for  expulsion  of  uterine  fibroids; 
he  observed  that  pelvic  abscesses  may  become 
encysted  and  undergo  alteration  without  being 
discharged,  and  his  name  is  associated  with  the 
innovation  of  stitching  the  open  sac  to  the  ab- 
dominal wound  after  enucleation  of  cysts  of  the 
broad  ligament.  His  text-books,  a  Treatise  an 
the  Theory  and  Practice  of  Obstetrics,  and  the 
Medical  and  Surgical  Treatment  of  Women, 
were  standard  in  their  time.  For  years,  Byford 
was  one  of  the  most  familiar  figures  in  the  gyne- 
cologic and  obstetric  circles  of  the  city,  and  all 
agi'ced  that  his  reputation  was  honestly  acquired 
and  well-deserved. 

Obstetrics  at  the  college  was  taught  by  that 
upright  man,  E.  O.  F.  Roler — Byford's  pupil 
— who  unfortunately  suffered  constantly  and 
terribly  from  organic  headaches,  but  lectured 
splendidly  and  kept  near  the  head  of  his  profes- 
sion. 

Henry  Gradle  was  the  physiologist,  and  an 


44         The  Don  Quiocote  of  Psychiatry 

excellent  one;  he  was  noted  for  his  scientific  and 
literary  education. 

Samuel  J.  Jones  was  the  ophthalmologist 
and  otologist.  He  was  an  old  naval  surgeon, 
pedantic,  pompous,  a  trifle  antiquated,  and  jeal- 
ous of  the  younger  generation  which  was  making 
inroads  into  his  specialty. 

James  Stewart  Jewell,  tall  and  thin,  with 
impressive  and  courtly  manners,  was  a  member 
of  the  first  graduating  class  of  the  Chicago  Med- 
ical College,  and  his  first  connexion  with  the  fac- 
ulty was  in  the  department  of  anatomy.  Seven 
years  later  he  resigned  his  professorship,  his 
reason  being  that  in  order  to  become  a  better 
teacher  in  the  Sabbath  schools  he  found  it  neces- 
sary to  visit  the  Holy  Land  to  study  biblical  his- 
tory at  its  source.  Upon  his  return  in  1871 — 
disappointed  in  the  backwardness  of  Palestine — 
he  decided  to  specialize  in  nervous  and  mental 
diseases,  and  was  at  once  appointed  to  this  chair 
in  the  college.  In  1874  he  established  the  Jour- 
nal of  Nervous  and  Mental  Disease,  and  under 
his  editorship  it  was  the  foremost  journal  of  its 
kind  in  America,  and  compared  favorably  with 
any  similar  periodical  published  in  Europe. 
Jewell  suffered  from  intestinal  tuberculosis, 
but  was  a  hard  and  efficient  worker.     He  pos- 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College  45 


2^ 


/■ 


-     ^T^ 


1 JkJ' 


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'^•^^^'-     -.-r^ 


^  c-- 


LETTER    FROM    J.    S.    JEWELL 


46         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

sessed  the  best  neurological  library  in  the  West. 
Hammond's  Treatise  on  Insanity  was  dedicated 
to  Jewell,  'whose  learning  has  always  com- 
manded my  heartiest  admiration,  and  whose 
friendship  is  one  of  the  greatest  pleasures  of  my 
life.'  Jewell  was  indeed  a  worthy  man,  his 
chief  fault  being  that  he  wrote  his  correspon- 
dence on  fancy  note-paper  and  mailed  it  in  cute 
little  envelopes,  so  that  if  you  received  one  of  his 
missives  in  the  presence  of  company,  they  were 
likely  to  wink  and  ask,  'What's  her  name?' 

The  learned  Hosmer  Allen  Johnson,  the 
professor  of  medicine,  was  probably  the  best 
throat  and  chest  doctor  in  the  West  at  that  time 
tho  he  himself  was  a  life-long  victim  of  bronchial 
trouble.  He  was  a  fine  teacher,  an  admirable 
character,  an  old-fashioned  scholar,  a  credit  to 
the  profession.  Like  Andrews  and  Byford  and 
Davis,  he  came  from  Rush  at  the  time  of  the 
schism. 

Then  there  were  H.  P.  Merriman,  the  gen- 
tlemanly and  conscientious  lecturer  on  medical 
jurisprudence  and  hygiene;  Marcus  P.  Hat- 
field, the  professor  of  chemistry  and  toxicology; 
and  Lester  Curtis,  the  able  histologist  and 
teacher. 

But  towering  above  all,  and  ecHpsing  all,  was 


'U<-^^-^^ 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         47 

the  eminent  dean  of  the  faculty,  Nathan  Smith 
Davis.  No  medical  event  in  Chicago  was  com- 
plete without  his  participation.  He  was  not 
named — as  some  have  supposed — after  Nathan 
Smith,  the  medical  Hercules  who  founded 
Dartmouth  Medical  College,  and  for  a  dozen 
years  constituted  its  entire  Faculty,  teaching 
every  subject  himself.  Nathan  Smith  Davis, 
the  son  of  Dow  and  Abagail  Davis,  was  bom  in 
1817,  in  a  log-cabin,  barefoot,  and  stayed  that 
way  for  several  years.  He  grew  up  an  untu- 
tored farm-boy  in  an  unsettled  district.  One 
day,  Dow  Davis,  standing  in  the  fields,  saw  him 
trying  to  drive  a  plow  and  oxen  with  one  hand, 
and  holding  a  book  in  the  other.  Dow  Davis 
was  not  as  erudite  as  Joseph  Leidy,  but  he  em- 
phatically knew  that  decent  plowing  requires 
all  the  hands  a  man  has.  Accordingly  he  de- 
cided that  since  his  sixteen-year-old  son  was  more 
interested  in  cultivating  his  mind  than  the 
ground,  there  was  nothing  to  do  but  send  him  to 
Cazenovia  Academy. 

At  seventeen  he  began  to  study  medicine 
under  the  preceptorship  of  Daniel  Claek,  and 
soon  entered  college.  Davis  later  achieved  the 
distinction  of  having  a  biographer,  who  says  he 
'feels  perfectly  safe  in  hazarding  the  assertion 


48         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

that  the  student  by  the  name  of  Davis  never 
was  passed  up,  never  smoked  cigarettes,  never 
came  home  at  night  when  he  was  unable  to  find 
the  keyhole,  never  fell  in  love  with  the  college 
widow,  and  never  indulged  in  any  of  the  rowdy- 
ish  freaks  which  have  always  accentuated  and 
frequently  disgraced  student  life.'  In  1837, 
while  still  a  minor,  Davis  graduated  from  the 
College  of  Physicians  and  Surgeons  of  Western 
New  York;  the  school  has  long  been  silent,  but 
in  those  days  it  harbored  a  teacher  like  Theo- 
DORic  RoMEYN  Beck,  the  gi-eatest  American 
name  in  medical  jurisprudence.  More  than 
ninety  years  have  gone  by  since  his  Elements  of 
Medical  Jurisprudence  appeared,  but  like 
James  Parkinson's  description  of  paralysis 
agitans,  it  remains  unsurpassed. 

Immediately  after  obtaining  his  diploma,  Dr 
Davis  settled  in  Vienna — Vienna,  Oneida  Coun- 
ty, State  of  New  York,  not  the  other  Vienna. 
Nathan  Smith  Davis  was  too  much  of  an 
American  to  waste  any  time  abroad.  We  have 
been  told  that  the  foreign  Vienna  is  the  gayer 
of  the  two,  but  the  young  doctor  did  not  find  it 
dull  where  he  was,  for  there  was  a  girl  in  town 
named  Anna  Parker — who  was  not  a  college 
widow — and  it  may  be  maintained  that  a  youth 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         49 

who  woos  a  ni.'iid  in  Vienna,  Oneida  County, 
State  of  New  York,  is  less  lonesome  than  a  youth 
who  doesn't  know  an  enchantress  in  the  real  Vi- 
enna. They  were  married,  and  remained  in  that 
civil  state  for  over  sixty-six  years. 

Davis  grew  too  big  for  the  place,  and  came  to 
New  York  City  in  1847.  The  following  year 
he  delivered  a  course  of  lectures  on  Medical 
Jurisprudence,  his  favorite  subject  ever  since  he 
heard  Theodoric  Romeyn  Beck.  He  probably 
expected  to  remain  here  for  some  years  at  least, 
but  John  Evans,  professor  of  obstetrics  at  Rush 
Medical  College,  was  in  the  East  at  this  time, 
and  invited  Davis  to  occupy  the  vacant  chair  of 
physiology  and  pathology.  Thus,  in  1849,  when 
the  college  was  six  years  old,  Davis  became  a 
westerner  in  order  to  join  Chicago's  earliest 
medical  institution.  Ten  years  later  he  was  one 
of  those  who  spoke  to  Brainard  of  increased  in- 
struction, periodic  examinations  and  entrance  re- 
quirements— tho  he  had  none  himself — and  when 
Daniel  Brainard  said,  'Not  necessary,'  Davis 
was  one  of  those  who  walked  out  of  Rush,  and  in 
a  short  time  he  was  delivering  the  introductory 
lecture  at  the  new  Chicago  jNIedical  College. 

It  was  as  dean  of  this  institution — the  first  in 
this   country   which    demanded    three   years    of 


50         The  Don  Quiocote  of  Psychiatry 

graded  instruction — that  Davis  became  the  most 
celebrated  medical  man  in  Chicago,  unless  he 
was  such  already.  He  founded  societies  and 
hospitals,  and  by  his  successful  efforts  to  organ- 
ize a  national  medical  association  he  earned  that 
badge  of  fame — a  sobriquet.  Just  as  Benja- 
min Rush  is  known  as  the  American  Hip- 
pocrates, and  John  Morgan  as  the  Father  of 
American  INIedical  Education,  and  Philip  Syng 
Physick  as  the  Father  of  American  Surgery, 
and  James  Thacher  as  the  Father  of  American 
Medical  Biography,  and  Benjamin  Water- 
house  as  the  Jenner  of  America,  so  Nathan 
Smith  Davis  is  known  as  the  Father  of  the 
American  Medical  Association;  he  is  the  only 
man  who  was  twice  its  president.  Davis  was  a 
powerful  speaker  and  a  writer  of  ability. 
Among  his  numerous  works  are  the  History  of 
Medical  Education  and  Institutions  in  the 
United  States,  and  History  of  the  American 
Medical  Association.  He  was  the  first  editor  of 
the  Journal  of  the  American  Medical  Associa- 
tion,  and  had  edited  seven  other  periodicals. 

He  made  no  contributions  of  importance  to 
the  science  of  medicine,  but  impressed  himself 
upon  his  profession  and  generation  by  his  force- 
ful personality.     He  was  always  'a  character.' 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         51 

In  spite  of  the  encomiums  which  have  been  heaped 
upon  his  virtues,  and  much  of  which  he  undoubt- 
edly deserved,  it  is  a  matter  of  congratulation 
that  his  type  is  passing  away.  Agassiz  may 
have  been  a  fanatical  opponent  of  Darwinism, 
but  he  remained  a  pioneer  in  ichthyology;  Aus- 
tin Flint  was  certainly  an  obscurantist  in  re- 
ligion, but  he  was  open  to  new  ideas  in  physical 
diagnosis ;  Marion  Sims  may  have  been  undemo- 
cratic in  his  penchant  for  royal  glitter,  but  he 
was  always  a  pathfinder  in  operative  gynecology. 
But  Nathan  Smith  Davis  was  an  all-around 
bigot — a  bigot  in  religion,  a  bigot  in  politics,  a 
bigot  in  science.  After  helping  to  reform  the 
medical  curriculum  in  1859,  he  closed  the  door 
of  his  mind  and  would  no  more  think  of  allowing 
a  new  idea  to  enter  than  of  changing  his  Andrew 
Jackson  face  and  swallow-tailed  coat. 

For  years  he  opposed  everything  new  in  medi- 
cine. Seeing  the  hypodermic  syringe  used  in 
Europe,  George  T.  Elliott  and  Fordyce 
Barker  introduced  it  into  America,  but  Davis 
met  it  with  anathemas.  During  the  civil  war 
John  Shaw^  Billings  used  a  clinical  thermom- 
eter, and  later  the  elder  Seguin  wrote  books 
about  the  instriunent,  but  Davis  thundered 
against  the  innovation.     'Why  do  I  need  a  ther- 


52         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

mometer?'  he  cried.  'Can't  I  tell  a  fever  with 
my  hand?'  Davis  was  fond  of  lecturing  on  ty- 
phoid fever,  and  would  give  a  long  list  of  etio- 
logical factors  which  he  regarded  as  conclusive. 
'And  yet,'  he  added  in  ineffable  scorn  to  the  class 
of  1879,  'some  day  some  Dutchman  will  come 
along  and  tell  us  that  typhoid  is  caused  by  a 
bug!'  And  the  very  next  year  a  'Dutchman,' 
named  Caul  E berth,  did  come  along  and  prove 
that  typhoid  is  caused  only  by  a  'bug,'  and  today 
every  dispensary-patient  knows  it. 

Not  a  hint  of  these  characteristics  is  to  be 
found  in  the  biography  of  Davis  or  in  any  sketch 
that  we  have  seen;  apparently  Dr  Danforth 
thought  it  more  important  to  open  his  tenth 
chapter  with  the  solemn  statement,  'It  is  an  his- 
toric fact  which  I  have  upon  the  excellent  au- 
thority of  Mrs  Davis  herself  that  Dr  Davis 
never  tasted  an  alcoholic  beverage  in  all  his  life.' 
At  a  testimonial  banquet  given  in  honor  of 
Davis^  Robert  H.  Babcock  said,  'As  an  alum- 
nus of  the  old  Chicago  Medical  College,  I  call 
on  you  to  rise,  and  in  that  beverage  which  Dr 
Davis  loves  and  has  continued  to  pledge  his  life, 
drink  to  his  health.'  'Pure  water,'  exclaimed 
Davis^  'nature's  universal  aseptic;  it  disorders 
no  man's  brain;  it  fills  no  asylums  or  prisons;  it 


,/.  J.  9 


C^.--\y^^-^ 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         53 

begets  no  anarchy,  but  it  sparkles  in  the  dew- 
drop,  it  glows  in  the  peaceful  rain])Ow,  and  flows 
in  the  river  of  life  close  by  the  throne  of  God. 
Let  us  take  it,  not  only  as  guests  here,  but  for 
the  whole  profession  of  America.'  Let  us  also, 
if  we  feel  convinced  that  the  water  contains  no 
typhoid  bacilli,  drink  to  the  memory  of  the  sturdy 
old  Doctor  who  meant  well.  wSpiritus  frumenti 
and  spiritus  vini  gallici  have  been  denied  a  place 
in  the  latest  edition  of  our  Pharmacopeia:  we 
wish  there  were  also  a  way  of  expelling  narrow- 
mindedness  from  science. 

So  on  the  whole  it  was  a  worthy  and  compe- 
tent teaching-staff,  comparing  favorably  with 
any  that  could  be  found  in  the  United  States. 
Clevenger  was  glad  to  breathe  the  atmosphere 
of  a  temple  of  knowledge.  He  fervently  hoped 
that  never  again  would  his  path  in  life  cut  across 
a  political  trail — for  within  the  sanctuary  of  sci- 
ence what  boodler  dare  intrude?  The  Hon. 
Michael  McDonald,  Cook  County's  boss, 
under  whose  foot  Chicago  bent;  King  Mike  in 
truth,  no  man  receiving  any  city  job  Avithout  his 
approval,  no  man  being  discharged  without  his 
consent,  ruling  the  mayor,  dictatmg  to  judges, 
controlling  the  police,  selling  the  streets  to  rail- 


54         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ways,  collecting  and  disbursing  the  taxes  and 
revenues — even  he  could  have  no  jurisdiction 
over  a  disciple  of  Hippocrates.  Clevenger 
was  now  among  scholars  and  gentlemen:  he  had 
looked  his  last  upon  the  grafter's  face. 

The  fourth  of  March,  1879,  was  the  great  day 
which  crowned  the  ambitions  of  years — gradua- 
tion. The  exercises  were  held  at  Plymouth 
Church  on  Michigan  Avenue.  The  dean  and 
members  of  the  faculty  sat  on  the  platform — 
which  was  further  decorated  with  banners  and 
flowers  and  ladies.  A  large  concourse  had  been 
invited  and  looked  with  interest  at  the  ex-stu- 
dents. But  it  is  to  be  feared  that  the  new  doc- 
tors were  not  over-attentive  to  the  clergyman's 
invocation  or  to  the  dean's  opening  address. 
Even  on  solemn  occasions  boys  are  not  inclined 
to  listen  to  the  advice  of  old  men. 

Indeed,  only  the  previous  year  the  seniors 
went  so  far  as  to  print  a  circular  of  their  own — 
outside  of  the  official  program.  The  Faculty 
heard  of  the  affair,  and  on  graduation  night 
every  boy  was  searched,  but  nothing  was  found 
— of  course  not,  since  some  friendly  girls  smug- 
gled the  circulars  in  under  their  shawls.  And 
while  the  minister  was  calling  down  the  divine 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         55 

blessing  upon  tlic  assembly,  these  leaflets  were 
distributed,  and  it  is  surprising  that  Dean  Davis 
escaped  a  fit  of  apo2)lexy,  for  seldom  has  GuT- 
TENiiEiic's  invention  issued  so  scandalous  a 
screed.  On  the  first  j^age,  in  large  letters,  was 
the  announcement:  'Another  Batch  of  Sawbones 
to  Swell  the  Already  Hyperemic  Ranks  of  the 
Disease  Accelerators.'  Under  the  heading, 
'Bill  of  Fare,'  were  these  items: 

Music — Pity  the  First  Patient. 

Prayer — Now  I  Lay  Me  Down  to  Sleep. 

Music — Why  Don't  the  Baby  Come.? 

(Intermission  to  allow  the  ushers  to  sprinkle  chloride 
of  lime  over  the  feet  of  the  graduates.) 

Grand  Entre — The  saloon  keeper  and  laundryman 
with  due  bills.     Panic  among  the  students. 

Undress — Class  Picture  as  an  Anthelmintic. 

Valedictory. — Vermiform  Appendix  as  a  Switch. 

Music — It  is  Finished. 

On  the  second  and  succeeding  pages,  under 
the  caption  of  'Chancres,'  various  classmates 
were  characterized;  we  select,  from  the  original 
circular,  some  of  the  more  reserved: 

G.  B.  Abbott:  He  wanted  to  be  Valedictorian,  and 
by  voting  for  himself  twice  succeeded  in  getting  three 
votes,  thus  showing  his  popularity  with  the  class. 


56         The  Don  Quivote  of  Psychiatry 

E.  Moore:  As  friends,  we  advise  you  to  proffer 
your  services  to  a  bird  store  on  Clark  street,  where  a 
young  man  is  wanted  to  chew  crumbs  for  sick  canaries. 

J.  W.  Dall  :  This  cross  between  a  half-breed  and  an 
anthropoid  ape  will  make  a  first  class  abortionist,  as 
that  sickly  smile  of  his  would  give  a  parturient  woman 
convulsions. 

P.  M.  WooDwoETH :  The  appearance  of  this  lean, 
lank,  lantern-jawed  limb  of  laziness  is  so  suggestive 
that  he  had  better  resolve  himself  into  an  agent  for  a 
tombstone  factory. 

W.  R.  Speaker  :  He  cannot  tell  the  difference  be- 
tween the  Eustachian  and  Fallopian  tubes,  altho  he 
has  devoted  the  last  three  years  to  calico  dresses  and 
petticoats. 

N.  J.  Neilson,  alias  Charlie  Ross:  Carry  the  news 
to  his  paternal  ancestors  that  Charlie  is  alive,  and 
today  graduates  at  the  Chicago  Medical  College.  Ru- 
mors afloat  that  he  was  preserved  in  alcohol.  Bar- 
NUM  has  telegraphed  to  his  agent  to  secure  him  at  any 
price.  Charlie  has  consented,  and  will  travel  as 
Barnum's  What  is  it. 

Personal:  An  embryotic  physician,  rather  tall  (6  ft. 
6),  not  handsome,  sore  eyes,  but  rich  (as  Job's  tur- 
key), wishes  to  correspond  with  a  lady  of  color,  on 
Biler  avenue.    Address  Dr  Hastings  or  Buck,  C.  M.  C. 

S.  Mac  Wiley:  The  valedictorian  will  disembowel 
himself  before  the  august  assembly.     For  profundity 


At  the  Chicago  Medical  College         57 

of  thought  and  prolixity  of  expression  he  is  par  ex- 
cellence. He  is  an  oratorical  flower  by  the  wayside. 
Gaze  upon  the  prodigy,  the  wind-bag  of  nothingness. 

Just  to  prove  that  youthful  audacity  has  no 
limits,  the  conspirators  capped  their  impudence 
by  announcing  that  the  leaflet  was  printed  by 
the  Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental  Disease. 
Poor  Professor  Jewell! 

If  we  could  follow  Clevenger^s  classmates 
out  into  the  world,  no  doubt  we  would  find  that 
some  became  rich  in  practice,  and  others  won- 
dered why  luck  was  against  them;  that  most  of 
them  married,  and  that  a  few  remained  deaf  to 
the  harmony  of  wedding-bells — yet  all  these 
things  we  merely  surmise  from  our  general 
knowledge  of  the  human  race;  we  really  possess 
no  authoritative  information,  for  oblivion  has 
covered  the  tracks  of  the  class  of  1879,  and  we 
must  bid  these  boys  farewell. 

Only  Clevenger  has  come  across  our  horizon, 
and  we  have  already  seen  him  carrying  the  tin- 
can  from  Dunning  to  his  home  several  miles 
away.  If  we  wonder  as  to  its  contents,  our 
curiosity  will  soon  be  appeased,  for  he  has  now 
reached  his  room  and  approached  his  laboratory- 
desk;  he  takes  off  the  pail's  cover,  carefully  turns 
the  pail  over,  and  out  rolls  the  brain  of  a  lunatic. 


58         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Ever  since  his  graduation  he  had  been  engaged 
in  neuro-pathological  studies,  performing  autop- 
sies at  the  asylum,  and  bringing  the  brains  to 
his  room  for  detailed  investigation. 


Ill 

MEDICINE  UNDER  KING  MIKE 

ABOUT  this  time  there  was  a  proposition  to 
appoint  a  special  pathologist  to  the  asylum, 
and  what  more  logical  candidate  was  there  than 
Dr  Shobal  Vail  Clevenger?  He  was  already 
doing  the  work — privately;  now  let  him  do  it — 
officially.  Some  of  the  most  prominent  physi- 
cians in  Chicago — Dean  Davis  and  Professor 
Rea  among  them — wrote  letters  urging  that  he 
be  appointed.  The  superintendent  of  the 
asylum,  Dr  J.  C.  Spray,  was  favorably  disposed 
towards  him  and  one  day  proposed,  'Come  along 
with  me  and  see  if  you  can  pass  muster.' 

To  Clevenger's  astonishment  he  brought  him 
into  a  drinking-saloon  on  Clark  street;  the  pro- 
prietor, an  ordinary-looking  fellow,  was  leaning 
on  the  customer's  side  of  the  long  counter. 
Spray  went  over  to  him  and  Cle\tenger  heard 
him  whisper,  'This  is  the  doctor  I  was  telling 
you  about.'     At  these  words  the  saloon-keeper 

raised  himself,  looked  at  Cle^':enger  for  a  mo- 

59 


60         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ment,  nodded  quietly,  and  put  out  one  finger  for 
him  to  shake.  'I  congratulate  you,'  smiled 
Spray  to  Clevenger. 

It  seemed  like  a  joke,  yet  they  were  in  a  seri- 
ous place:  on  the  first  floor  were  the  wines  and 
liquors,  on  the  second  floor  were  the  roulette 
wheels  and  faro  layouts,  while  the  third  seemed 
limited  to  whoredom — yet  that  den  was  the  true 
City  Hall  of  Chicago,  and  Clevenger  had 
touched  the  hand  of  royalty.  It  was  King  Mike 
whose  nod  had  made  him  Special  Pathologist  to 
the  Cook  County  Insane  Asylum;  had  Mike 
turned  away  from  him,  all  the  recommendations 
of  all  the  physicians  in  Chicago  would  have 
availed  him  nothing. 

It  smote  the  conscience  of  Clevenger  to  ac- 
cept a  position  from  Michael  McDonald — yet 
it  was  his  heart's  desire.  He  found  excuses  for 
himself;  he  looked  at  John  Campbell  Spray; 
he  too  was  a  medical  man  and  an  alumnus  of  the 
same  school,  and  still  he  remained  superintendent 
of  the  asylum  for  years  with  apparently  no 
trouble.  • 

No  sooner  did  Clevenger  enter  the  asylum  as 
pathologist  than  all  doubt  vanished.  The  mate- 
rials for  original  study  were  so  vast,  every  one 
of  the  seven  hundred  patients  presented  so  many 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  01 

interesting  problems,  that  his  contentment  was 
supreme.  He  grudged  every  moment  he  had  to 
waste  on  eating,  sleeping,  shaving — his  wife  had 
her  troubles.  He  was  surprised  to  find  that  no 
records  of  cases  had  been  kept,  so  he  secured 
large  blankbooks  and  wrote  up  the  histories  from 
all  available  data.  He  was  forty  years  of  age, 
and  to  the  strength  of  a  man  he  added  the  en- 
thusiasm of  a  youth.  Day  and  night  he  was  on 
the  go — diagnosing  new  cases,  re-examining  old 
ones,  making  post-mortems,  cutting  with  his 
microtome,  looking  thru  his  microscope,  prepar- 
ing reports  for  the  press — he  filled  scientific 
periodicals  with  his  contributions. 

Clevenger  became  known  as  a  man  worth 
watching,  and  when  the  time  came  to  elect  a  new 
superintendent,  he  was  asked  to  be  a  candidate. 
Unwilling,  however,  to  spend  time  in  administra- 
tive duties,  he  suggested  for  this  position  Dr 
James  George  Kiernan,  who  was  elected.  An- 
other change  was  made  by  the  Commissioners. 
Dr  Spray  had  been  given  entire  control  of  the 
institution,  but  Dr  Kiernan 's  authority  was 
divided,  for  he  was  the  medical  superintendent 
only,  while  JNIr  Harry  Varnell^  a  handsome 
fellow,  was  appointed  warden,  and  took  charge 
of  the  domestic  and  financial  management. 


62         The  Don  Quivote  of  Psychiatry 

Clevenger  was  glad  that  Kiernan  had  super- 
seded Spray.  For  Spray  proved  to  be  one  of 
those  doctors  who  like  to  be  considered  ethical  by 
their  confreres,  but  like  still  more  to  eat  the  po- 
litical pie.  Altho  descended  from  Quaker  par- 
ents, he  seemed  to  have  borrowed  his  manners 
from  Mike  McDonald's  gang,  for  he  was  con- 
stantly threatening  to  whip  and  shoot  people, 
and  on  the  slightest  provocation  pulled  out  his 
revolver.  Moreover  he  was  as  ignorant  as  medi- 
cal politicians  usually  are.  Clevenger  had  come 
across  a  female  patient  who  alternated  her  stu- 
porous state  by  somersaulting  along  the  ward 
corridor;  examining  her  further,  he  was  inter- 
ested to  find  it  was  a  case  of  katatonia,  an  uncom- 
mon disorder  which  had  been  described  by  Kahl- 
BAUM  of  Gorlitz.  Immediately  he  told  Spray 
of  his  discovery,  and  was  met  with  the  retort, 
'The  damned  Dutch  are  always  doing  things 
like  that.  I  never  heard  of  that,  and  I  don't 
believe  there  is  no  such  disease.' 

Then  Kiernan  was  certainly  more  interested 
in  reform  than  Spray.  And  as  time  went  on 
Clevenger  could  not  help  but  notice  gross  abuse. 
Even  before  Kiernan 's  appointment  he  was  im- 
pressed with  the  fact  that  a  lady  physician  was 
needed  for  the  female  department.     Clevenger 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  68 

thought  of  two  influential  women  whom  he  knew, 
Mrs  Helen  Sitedd  and  her  friend  Mrs  Ei-len 
Henrotin,  the  wife  of  Mr  Charles  Henrotin, 
the  first  president  of  the  Chicago  Stock  Ex- 
change, and  known  as  'the  most  decorated  man 
in  Chicago,'  because  of  the  numerous  ribbons  and 
medals  he  received  from  foreign  governments 
where  he  had  served  as  consul.  Clevenger  dis- 
cussed the  subject  with  them,  mentioning  that 
a  lady  physician  had  never  been  appointed  to  a 
public  asylum  before  and  detailing  what  quali- 
fications she  would  have  to  possess.  'Such  a 
woman  as  you  described  to  me,'  answered  Mrs 
Shedd  a  few  days  later,  'would  require  almost 
an  act  of  special  creation,  yet  I  fully  understand 
you  cannot  abate  one  of  the  requisitions  named, 
as  they  are  vital  to  the  success  of  the  experiment.' 
Mrs  Shedd  and  Mrs  Henrotin  managed  to  in- 
terest the  Chicago  Women's  Club  in  the  matter, 
with  the  result  that  on  May  1,  1884,  Dr  Delia 
E.  Howe  moved  into  the  asylmn — and  found 
plenty  to  do. 

Clevenger  had  not  been  long  at  Dunning  be- 
fore he  heard  that  the  milk  given  to  the  patients 
in  the  dement  wards  frequently  caused  fatal  epi- 
demics. Examining  this  milk  he  found  it  of  low 
specific  gravity  and  of  acid  reaction,  but  he  found 


64         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

no  suspicion  of  cream.  Always  curious,  he  de- 
termined to  learn  what  became  of  the  cream. 
One  day  he  waited  in  the  kitchen  ice-house,  and 
saw  an  attendant  skim  the  cream  from  the  milk- 
cans  and  carry  it  outside.  Then  he  understood. 
For  out  in  the  yard  were  expensive  kennels  where 
King  Mike  kept  his  hunting-dogs — thorobred 
hounds,  setters,  pointers,  retrievers.  Clevenger 
went  back  to  his  work  of  classifying  patients.  .  .  . 

There  was  little  F.  S.,  only  six  years  old,  the 
youngest  patient  in  the  asylum.  He  was  a  vic- 
tim of  heredity,  the  usual  etiology  of  insanity. 
Show  us  one  hundred  lunatics  and  we  know  what 
caused  the  mental  disease  in  most  of  them:  the 
parent.  In  the  Cook  County  Insane  Asylum 
were  whole  families,  father  or  mother,  and  broth- 
ers and  sisters,  with  occasional  uncles  and  aunts 
and  cousins,  all  insane  together.  Well  might 
they  curse  the  ancestry  that  brought  them  forth 
with  a  germ-plasm  biologically  defective,  and 
bitterly  may  we  condemn  that  system  of  society 
which  encourages  these  unfortunates  to  sow  their 
malformed  seed. 

There  was  Joseph  C,  the  Bohemian  shoe- 
maker. He  would  be  sitting  or  standing  on  the 
grounds,  quiet  and  subdued,  when  without  warn- 
ing such  an  uncontrollable  rage  would  seize  him 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  65 

that  it  required  a  force  of  strong  attendants  to 
hold  him.  Agile  and  crafty,  he  once  hoi  ted  thru 
the  door,  and  in  spite  of  his  straight- jacket 
ran  up  the  ladder  to  the  roof,  and  danced  upon 
the  chimney-tops.  But  he  sold  his  freedom  for 
a  plug  of  tobacco;  it  was  held  out  to  him  as  a 
bait,  and  while  attempting  to  take  it  with  his 
teeth,  his  feet  were  pinioned,  and  like  a  wounded 
eagle  he  was  returned  to  captivity. 

There  was  R.  D.,  the  Scotch  bookkeeper.  He 
had  been  an  exhorter  in  the  Methodist  Church, 
and  all  was  well  vnitil  in  a  newspaper  he  noticed 
an  advertisement  about  the  errors  of  youth.  As 
he  was  guilty  of  involuntary  seminal  ejaculations 
he  knew  the  advertisement  was  personally  aimed 
at  him,  and  he  further  knew  it  was  inserted  by  a 
Reverend  Doctor  Inman,  of  New  York.  To 
escape  this  malign  advertisement  he  fled  home, 
but  it  stared  him  in  the  face  from  his  native  vil- 
lage paper  in  Scotland.  He  sailed  to  oNIontreal, 
but  found  every  one  discussing  Inman's  adver- 
tisement. He  shipped  to  the  Indian  archipelago, 
but  the  bluff  old  sea-captain  insinuated  that 
Scotchy  was  not  as  pure  as  he  might  be.  He 
went  to  Cape  Town,  South  Africa,  and  there  he 
saw  Inman's  advertisement  printed  in  Boerish 
Dutch — altho  he  didn't  understand  a  word  of 


66         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Boerish  Dutch.  He  hastened  back  to  America, 
but  noticed  that  the  Chicago  police  had  read  In- 
man's  advertisement,  for  they  followed  him 
wherever  he  went.  Indeed,  one  policeman  got  on 
the  same  car  that  he  did;  his  forbearance  was  at 
an  end,  and  he  struck  the  city  guardian  to  his 
knees.  He  was  promptly  arrested,  but  after  tell- 
ing his  tale  of  persecution  was  not  sent  to  prison 
but  to  the  asylum. 

There  was  Emil  Rein,  the  old  German  mu- 
sician. For  years  he  was  the  leader  of  a  musical 
society  in  Chicago,  but  alcohol  jarred  the  mel- 
ody of  his  life.  He  became  so  abusive  to  his 
relatives  that  he  was  sent  to  Dunning.  Here 
his  behavior  must  have  delighted  the  recording 
angel.  It  was  his  pleasure  to  teach  music  to  the 
children  and  to  play  for  the  amusement  of  the 
patients.  His  amnesia  was  marked,  and  he 
could  not  remember  the  names  of  his  pieces,  but 
when  some  one  started  to  hum  or  whistle  the  air, 
he  played  it  with  skilful  fingers.  At  the  asylum 
the  children  led  him  into  the  music-room,  and 
after  he  had  given  them  their  lesson  they  led  him 
back  to  his  ward,  for  he  was  as  docile  as  a  lamb 
in  a  picture.  His  conduct  was  so  irreproachable 
that  he  was  sent  home ;  immediately  he  got  drunk, 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  67 

seized  an  ax  and  smashed  his  piano,  and  tried  to 
murder  his  family. 

There  was  Mary  F.,  whose  mother  and  sister 
were  also  confined  to  the  asylum.  She  lay 
crouched  upon  the  floor,  with  her  beautiful  black 
hair  drawn  across  her  face,  listlessly  passing  her 
fingers  thru  the  entangled  coils,  but  beneath  the 
sable  meshes  was  a  bloated  visage  without  reason. 

There  was  Ingab,  R.,  a  Scandinavian.  She 
was  useful  in  the  ward,  helping  with  the  sewing 
and  cleaning;  she  had  regal  manners,  frowning 
severely  upon  all,  but  smiled  complacently  if  pet- 
ted or  flattered.  A  grand  juror,  a  countryman, 
once  visited  the  asylum  and  spoke  Swedish  to 
her;  she  answered  all  his  questions  so  intelli- 
gently and  otherwise  spoke  so  rationally  that  he 
angrily  demanded  her  instant  discharge  upon 
threat  of  bringing  the  matter  into  court.  Ingae. 
was  told  to  go  to  her  room  to  di-ess  for  town, 
while  her  bumptious  compatriot  waited  for  her. 
She  reappeared  with  a  gilt  paper  crown  on  her 
head,  a  robe  of  many  colors  with  window  tassels 
at  the  hem,  and  a  broom-stick  for  a  scepter. 
Pompously  approaching  the  grand  juror,  she 
informed  him  she  was  the  Queen  of  Tragedy  and 
the  Queen  of  Song,  and  a  few  other  queens,  and 
would  fine  him  five  dollars  for  daring  to  smoke 


68         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

in  her  presence — but  his  mouth  was  too  agape 
to  hold  a  cigar. 

There  was  young  Mary  Ryan,  the  Irish  immi- 
grant. A  happy  and  innocent  girl,  she  had  lived 
on  her  father's  farm  near  Dublin.  She  married 
and  came  with  her  husband  to  America,  and  in 
the  pitiless  streets  of  Chicago  he  left  her,  friend- 
less, penniless,  pregnant.  She  gave  birth  to  a 
girl  baby  at  a  public  place,  and  was  transferred 
to  the  asylum.  She  raved  incessantly.  She 
never  slept.  Sedatives  had  no  effect  on  her. 
She  died  exhausted. 

There  was  James  C,  the  lawyer  who  was 
picked  up  in  the  streets  of  Chicago  after  the 
great  fire.  That  terrifying  conflagration  which 
escaped  man's  masteiy,  the  uncontrolled  flames 
mocking  the  firemen  for  half  a  week,  burning  at 
Chicago's  heart  and  leaving  the  city  homeless, 
made  many  candidates  for  Dunning.  The  law- 
yer claimed  he  was  trying  a  case  in  court  when 
the  judge  turned  into  a  boa-constrictor  and  the 
jury  into  monkeys;  he  had  hallucinations  of  sight 
and  hearing,  yet  retained  much  of  his  former 
legal  ability,  and  one  of  the  asylum  attendants 
who  had  stolen  a  horse  sneaked  this  lawyer  out 
to  the  trial,  and  the  insane  attorney  successfully 
defended  his  client.     He  was  one  of  the  show 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  69 

patients,  but  would  not  rei)ly  to  queries  until 
the  visitors  handed  out  some  chews  of  tobacco. 
Once  he  turned  inquisitor  himself  and  asked, 
'You  know  that  Susan  B.  Anthony  is  president 
of  the  United  States?'  'Yes,'  answered  the 
caller,  thinking  it  expedient  to  acquiesce  in  all 
that  an  insane  j)erson  said.  'And  you  know  that 
Andrew  Jackson  is  vice-president,  and  that 
Harriet  Beecher  Stow^e  is  secretary  of  war, 
and  that  we  have  captured  England?'  'Yes.' 
'Well,  you  know  a  blamed  sight  more  than  I  do, 
and  you're  the  bigger  fool  of  the  two.' 

Another  fire  victim  was  a  motherly  soul,  a 
pious  respectable  matron  who  claimed  to  be  Mrs 
Lincoln,  and  consistently  said  her  maiden  name 
was  Todd  ;  she  would  sew  industriously  until  vis- 
itors annoyed  her  with  questions,  and  then  would 
turn  on  them  with  an  unexpected  torrent  of 
filth  and  ribaldry. 

There  was  Samuel  N.,  the  English  lithog- 
rapher, insane  over  spiritualism.  He  claimed 
he  was  arrested  for  writing  an  article  in  the  Re- 
ligio-Philosophical  Journal.  He  worked  several 
years  in  the  asylum  drug-room,  and  jocularly  re- 
marked that  he  'never  got  further  than  pound- 
ing cinchona  bark.'  He  could  be  trusted  any- 
where on  the  grounds,  as  he  was  under  the  im- 


70         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

pression  the  spirits  would  not  let  him  leave.  He 
threatened  to  take  away  spiritualistic  control 
from  bastard  mediums,  but  conferred  medium- 
ship  upon  Clevenger.  Every  morning  he 
adorned  the  trees  with  proclamations  against 
ghosts,  of  which  the  following  is  a  characteristic 
example:  'Little  Church  Round  the  Corner. 
Moral  Church  we  bury  our  brothers  in  one  piece. 
In  honor  of  the  canons  of  our  order.  Ladi  Lado 
Lade  Ladum  Lady.  These  ladies  know  nothing 
about  Red  Stockings.  In  honor  of  the  Nitric 
Acid  ceremonies.' 

There  was  Daniel  S.,  the  negro  teamster.  He 
imagined  himself  the  wealthy  owner  of  coal 
mines.  Once  he  saw  God  drive  in  a  chariot  to 
his  window  and  heard  him  say,  'Daniel,  come 
out.'  Accordingly  he  smashed  his  iron  bed  and 
employed  it  as  a  weapon  to  batter  down  the  pan- 
els of  his  door,  and  it  required  several  attendants 
to  prevent  him  from  obeying  the  Lord's  com- 
mand. 

There  was  J.  S.,  the  German  printer.  His 
case  excited  attention  and  was  reported  in  the 
newspapers.  He  had  fallen  in  love  with  a  young 
lady  who  was  living  with  his  wife;  she  returned 
his  passion,  but  as  she  could  not  marry  him,  she 
committed  suicide.     Husband  and  wife  identi- 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  71 

fied  her  body  when  it  was  fished  out  of  the  lake. 
After  that  nothing  in  life  interested  him,  and  he 
could  speak  of  nothing  except  his  misfortunes. 
The  cloud  of  melancholia  settled  upon  him.  He 
attempted  to  drown  himself,  had  unsystematized 
delusions  of  persecution,  and  saw  the  young  lady 
alive.  Many  graves  opened  to  him,  and  he  spoke 
to  persons  who  had  long  been  dead.  Clevenger 
induced  him  to  read  an  article  in  the  Zeitschrift 
fur  Psychiatrie,  and  the  patient  was  startled  to 
meet  a  case  similar  to  his  own.  It  sort  of  gave 
him  a  look  at  himself;  his  mind  cleared,  and 
he  was  discharged  as  cured,  going  back  to  his 
compositor's  trade. 

Another  interesting  patient  was  P.  Kelly, 
the  policeman.  He  was  patrolling  Halsted 
street  bridge  when  he  was  shot  in  the  neck  by  a 
burglar.  The  result  was  a  wound  of  the  cervical 
sympathetic,  causing  incurable  insanity,  a  genu- 
ine case  of  mania  from  traumatism.  The  case 
was  discussed  by  Dr  H.  Isl.  Bannister  in  the 
Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental  Disease^  and 
later  was  reported  by  Dr  Cle^tenger  in  the  Chi- 
cago Medical  Journal  and  Examiner.  The  bur- 
glar, a  friend  of  INIike  McDonald,  was  acci- 
dentally sentenced  for  a  term  of  six  years,  but 
as  soon  as  he  came  out  of  the  penitentiary,  Mike 


72         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

made  amends  by  appointing  him  an  attendant 
at  the  asjdum,  and  he  was  assigned  to  Kelly's 
ward,  thus  having  charge  of  his  shattered  victim. 

So  the  cases  ran,  hundreds  of  them,  illustrating 
every  variety  of  mental  disorder;  not  only  those 
we  have  named,  but  imbecility,  idiocy,  stuporous 
insanity,  transitory  frenzy,  brain  lesions,  and  the 
usual  assortment  of  senile  dements  and  the  he- 
bephreniacs,  'stranded  on  the  rock  of  pu- 
berty.' .  .  . 

At  length  Clevenger  completed  his  classifi- 
cations of  the  patients — on  paper,  but  he  wanted 
to  do  the  same  thing  in  fact.  He  therefore  ap- 
proached Warden  Varnell,  and  informed  him 
that  if  the  mild  cases  could  be  separated  from  the 
violent  ones,  their  chances  for  recovery  would 
be  increased.  He  started  to  explain  how  the 
treatment  of  the  insane  could  be  made  more  sci- 
entific, but  his  enthusiasm  was  cut  cold  by  a  reply 
which  he  never  forgot :  'To  hell  with  the  damned 
cranks,'  answered  Harry  Varnell.  'They  are 
cattle  to  me,  and  I  don't  give  a  damn  for  them 
and  am  here  for  boodle.  I'm  going  to  make  a 
pile  out  of  the  bughouse,  and  start  a  big  sporting 
place  in  the  city.'  Evidently  the  ambitious  war- 
den was  not  satisfied  with  the  medium-sized  gam- 
bling saloon  that  he  already  possessed.     While 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  73 

Clevenoer's  interest  in  pathology  did  not  cease 
after  this  conversation,  he  determined  to  do  some 
research  work  in  the  sociology  of  the  place. 

Clevenger  had  read  that  for  certain  cases  of 
mania  a  new  drug  was  being  recommended — sul- 
phonal.  The  conium  which  was  used  at  the  asy- 
lum was  often  inert  and  unreliable  and  he  re- 
quested the  warden  to  purchase  five  or  ten  dol- 
lars' worth  of  sulphonal  for  the  drug-room, 
which  was  so  poorly  stocked  that  there  was  less 
than  a  dram  of  quinine  at  a  time  when  many  of 
the  patients  were  suffering  from  intermittent 
fevers.  Varnell  refused  with  his  customary 
oath,  saying  the  damned  sulphonal  was  too  ex- 
pensive. But  Clevenger  learnt  that  the  next 
week  there  was  bought  by  the  management 
$1,500  worth  of  whisky,  wine  and  cigars — 
charged  as  sundry  drugs.  He  learnt  also  what 
became  of  these  drugs,  for  on  Saturday  night  he 
heard  a  female  giggle  the  command,  'Quit  pour- 
ing champagne  down  my  back,  Harry.' 

These  Saturday  nigjlit  frolics  were  gay  af- 
fairs. As  soon  as  it  grew  dark,  gangsters  and 
their  women  arrived,  keeping  up  night-long  or- 
gies that  made  the  imiiates  furious  for  want  of 
sleep.  Sometimes  they  would  amuse  the  patients 
by  shouting,  Fire!    It  must  have  been  a  cui'ious 


74         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

sight  for  Clevenger  to  watch  these  thugs  and 
shits  dancing  on  the  patients'  health  and  on  the 
people's  money.  The  asylum  was  the  ideal  place 
for  such  revels,  for  it  contained  expensive  Turk- 
ish and  Russian  baths,  built  'for  the  patients/ 
but  the  scaldings  discouraged  them  from  indulg- 
ing in  these  luxuries,  and  it  became  the  regula- 
tion thing  for  politicians  to  sleep  off  their  de- 
bauches in  the  bath-rooms,  being  massaged  to 
soberness  by  the  county  rubbers,  for  which  the 
people  seemed  to  pay  cheerfully,  as  it  was  not 
proper  that  the  County  Commissioners  should 
be  drunk  too  long. 

Clevenger  met  some  of  these  jolly  Commis- 
sioners from  time  to  time.  There  was  John 
Hannigan,  the  saloon-keeper;  Mike  Wasser- 
MANN,  who  ran  such  a  notorious  resort  under  the 
Brevoort  that  it  was  closed  by  the  police;  Dan 
Wren,  the  skilful  forger,  recently  out  of  jail; 
Mike  McCarthy,  the  ex-stevedore,  who  found 
politics  more  profitable  than  his  former  job; 
Buck  McCarthy,  the  drunken  terror  of  the 
stockyards  district,  a  strong  animal  who  won 
elections  with  his  fist. 

These  were  the  individuals  who  had  charge  of 
an  American  medical  institution  in  the  latter  part 
of  the  nineteenth  century.     Pinel  and  Chia- 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  7o 

RUGi,  Gardnkr  TThj.  and  Puny  Earl  spent 
years  attempting  to  ameliorate  the  conditions  of 
the  insane;  to  remove  iron  fetters  and  brutal 
keepers  from  these  helpless  people  was  the  aim 
of  the  devoted  lives  of  Doro'jiiea  Dix  and  John 
Conoli-y;  Reil  and  the  Tuke  family  worked 
with  tongue  and  pen  to  improve  the  lot  of  their 
fallen  brothers,  and  the  great  Esquirol  wrote 
Des  maladies  mentales  in  two  volumes — but 
Mike  McDonald  didn't  read  French. 

The  inmates  of  the  county  asylum  in  1883 
might  just  as  well  have  lived  before  Pinel's 
day,  for  they  derived  little  benefit  from  the  mod- 
ern methods  of  treating  the  insane.  Wilhelm 
Griesinger,  of  Stuttgart,  made  important  sug- 
gestions about  clinical  psychiatry  in  his  ArchiVj 
but  he  was  another  of  those  'damned  Dutchmen.' 
The  trouble  was  that  politics  ruled  the  asylum, 
while  science  was  the  despised  outcast.  The 
meanest  attendant  there  knew  that  his  job  was 
more  secure  than  the  physician's. 

On  the  first  of  September,  1884,  Dr  Charles 
KoLLER  was  elected  assistant  physician,  and  in 
November  he  was  discharged — probably  because 
he  found  maggots  in  a  festering  ulcer.  The  doc- 
tor left  his  effects  for  a  time  in  his  room;  they 
were  thrown  out  into  the  hall  by  the  housekeeper, 


76         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

and  Varnell  threatened  to  shoot  him  if  he  saw 
him  again. 

Dr  James  G.  Kiernan,  upon  becoming  medi- 
cal superintendent,  decided  to  make  some 
changes.  He  issued  three  orders:  first,  that  the 
attendants  should  restrain  patients  only  under  a 
physician's  direction;  second,  that  the  night- 
watch  should  not  administer  medicines  without  a 
physician's  specification;  third,  that  all  employes 
should  take  off  their  hats  when  passing  thru  the 
wards,  and  if  they  found  it  necessary  to  speak  to 
the  patients  should  address  them  as  Mr,  Mrs,  or 
Miss,  according  to  their  civil  state. 

No  attention  was  paid  to  these  requests,  but 
Dr  Kiernan,  an  impractical  man,  went  further. 
He  ordered  that  all  bruises  and  injuries  inflicted 
on  patients  should  be  dressed  at  once.  Also,  he 
closed  the  liquor  room  for  a  time,  and  the  engi- 
neer got  so  angry  he  swore  he  would  kick  the  door 
down  if  he  didn't  get  his  share  of  beer  and 
whisky.  A  female  patient  was  suffering  from  a 
disorder  peculiar  to  her  sex,  and  in  violation  of 
all  the  rules  of  common  humanity  and  hygiene, 
the  housekeeper.  Miss  McAndrews,  took  her 
from  her  ward  and  set  her  to  scrubbing  floors. 
When  Dr  Kiernan  expostulated  with  her,  she 
answered,  'I  do  not  propose  to  have  anything  to 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  77 

do  with  you  or  your  orders.'  The  entire  medical 
staff  united  in  a  request  for  Miss  JMcAndkkws' 
discharge,  but  they  were  invited  to  go  to  hell, 
and  Commissioner  Leyden  announced  that  if 
Dr  KiERNAN  mentioned  the  subject  again  he 
would  make  it  hot  for  him. 

For  such  and  similar  attempts  at  reforms  Dr 
KiERNAN  was  knocked  down  by  an  attendant, 
struck  by  the  engineer,  and  choked  by  the  night- 
watchman  so  that  he  had  a  hemorrhage  and  was 
confined  for  some  time  to  his  bed.  'What  are  you 
going  to  do  about  it?'  asked  the  political  em- 
ploye.   'You  haven't  got  enough  pull  to  fire  me.' 

Dr  Delia  E.  Howe  may  have  appreciated  the 
honor  of  being  the  first  medical  woman  in  a  pub- 
lic asylum,  yet  at  times  she  found  fame  a  trouble- 
some bubble.  She  found  that  the  patients  were 
insufficiently  clothed,  even  tho  they  brought 
clothes  with  them — the  attendants  often  stole  the 
patients'  bedding  and  raiment  to  help  pay  gam- 
bling debts;  and  while  suffering  from  a  lack  of 
proper  garments,  they  were  employed  in  making 
fancy  work  for  the  housekeeper  and  others;  nor 
were  they  allowed  to  come  from  their  rooms  until 
the  task  was  completed. 

The  dope-bottle  w^as  freely  dosed  out  to  pa- 
tients to  keep  them  quiet,  directly  against  the 


78         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

doctor's  instructions.  Dr  Howe  found  that  the 
drug-room  was  turned  into  a  saloon.  Often  she 
had  to  wait  for  a  prescription  needed  for  an  ur- 
gent case,  until  the  druggist  had  served  with 
beer,  port,  sherry,  or  whisky  a  room  full  of  men. 
She  never  visited  the  drug-room  but  with  trepi- 
dation, and  always  felt  relieved  when  she  left  its 
degrading  atmosphere.  The  pharmacist  repeat- 
edly remarked  that  the  drugs  sent  to  him  were 
unfit  to  be  compounded,  and  he  complained  of 
being  turned  into  a  bar-tender. 

Dr  Howe  was  much  annoyed  to  find  that  the 
mechanics  had  keys  to  the  female  wards,  and 
visited  them  at  all  hours  of  the  night.  The  as- 
sistant engineer  was  frequently  detected  there, 
amorous,  intoxicated,  half-dressed.  The  female 
patients  were  all  more  or  less  mentally  upset,  but 
several  of  them,  like  the  actress  Capitola  Del- 
ZELL,  were  neat  in  their  habits  and  comely  in 
face  and  body — and  they  were  also  helpless. 
Some  of  them  had  relatives  at  home,  praying 
and  waiting  for  their  recovery,  but  rape  was  not 
likely  to  aid  in  their  mental  restoration.  It  was 
now  easy  for  Dr  Howe  to  understand  where  the 
illegitimate  babies  came  from,  nor  was  it  difficult 
to  comprehend  why  mothers  who  had  insane  chil- 
dren fell  on  their  knees  before  judges  and  im- 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  79 

plored  them  to  send  their  daughters  anywhere 
except  to  Dunning.  Such  outrages  were  known 
to  the  community,  and  had  Chicago  been  one  of 
Walt  Whitman's  great  cities,  'where  the  popu- 
lace rise  at  once  against  the  never-ending  audac- 
ity of  elected  persons,'  the  county  commissioners 
and  their  henchmen  would  have  dangled  from 
the  nearest  telegraph-poles.  But  instead  of  that 
a  male  attendant  who  had  been  relieved  of  his 
key  because  he  entered  a  female  ward  too  clum- 
sily at  one  o'clock  in  the  morning,  received  the 
instrument  back  the  next  day,  and  Chicago 
boasted  that  the  statistics  of  the  cattle  industry 
showed  an  increase  over  last  year. 

One  of  Dr  Howe's  associates  observed  an  em- 
ploye pounding  a  defenceless  dement,  and  when 
she  sought  to  remonstrate,  she  received  what  she 
called  her  'first  taste  of  discipline,'  for  he  gave 
her  a  blow  that  felled  her  to  the  ground.  'What 
are  you  going  to  do  about  it?'  he  asked.  'You 
haven't  got  enough  pull  to  fire  me.'  Delia 
Howe  had  been  a  missionary  in  China — perhaps 
that  ruffian's  fist  convinced  her  that  reform 
should  begin  at  home. 

The  food,  so  important  a  consideration  in  the 
treatment  of  the  insane,  would  have  been  re- 
jected by  an  average  house-dog.     A  carpenter 


80         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

named  Hughes  once  saw  the  butcher  dump  a 
load  of  putrefying  meat  in  the  kitchen.  'What 
do  you  do  with  that?'  he  asked.  'That's  for  the 
cranks.'  'In  the  name  of  goodness,  you  don't 
mean  to  say  that  you  cook  that  for  them?'  'No, 
I  don't,  but  the  cook  does.  They  don't  know  the 
difference.'  The  patients  were  far  away  from 
the  sad  sea-waves,  yet  there  was  such  a  lack  of 
fruit  and  vegetables  that  many  of  them  suffered, 
and  some  of  them  perished,  from  the  former  'ca- 
lamity of  sailors,' — scurvy. 

The  chief  article  of  diet  was  pigs'  heads,  hair 
and  dirt  and  all— they  were  brought  to  the  tables 
unshaved  and  uncleaned.  With  her  spoon  Dr 
Howe  lifted  up  from  a  patient's  plate  the  head 
of  a  hog  suffering  from  catarrh,  and  in  its  un- 
washed snout  was  an  iron  ring.  When  the  relic 
was  exhibited  to  the  commissioners,  Mike  Was- 
SERMANN  queried,  'What  did  you  expect  to  find 
— ^gold  watches?'  But  the  other  commissioners 
viewed  the  situation  with  more  perspicuity,  and 
accordingly  decided:  Whereas,  it  is  unseemly 
that  iron  rings  should  be  found  in  pig-snouts, 
and  Whereas,  precautions  must  be  taken  against 
the  recurrence  of  such  an  accident,  Resolved,  that 
no  more  lady  physicians  be  employed  at  the  asy- 
lum.    Exit,  Dr  Howe. 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  81 

Clevengkh's  mail  jiiid  telcgj-arns  were  not  de- 
livered, and  once  wlien  he  stepped  into  Dychk'h 
drug-store,  I)rs  Quine  and  Baxter  happened  to 
be  there,  and  they  asked  him  why  he  did  not  an- 
swer telephone  calls — their  messages  to  him  had 
been  intercepted. 

Ci.evenger  was  informed  he  could  perform  no 
more  autopsies — it  was  against  religion.  This 
was  an  astonishing  bit  of  news  for  a  pathologist, 
but  there  was  really  nothing  surprising  about  it: 
the  commissioners  were  selling  the  bodies  to  the 
medical  schools. 

A  patient  complained  of  being  ill,  and  was 
constantly  going  for  water.  The  attendant  said 
to  him,  'Come,  Jack,  if  you  won't  work  I'll  put 
the  jacket  on  you.'  'I  can't  work.'  So  the  jacket 
was  put  on.  In  a  day  or  two  the  patient  died; 
cause  of  death — 'typhoid  fever.'  Not  only  were 
the  male  employes  a  coarse  set  of  men,  but  sev- 
eral of  the  female  attendants  were  frequently 
drunk  and  always  impudent.  Ireland  seemed  to 
have  emptied  her  scum  into  the  Cook  County  In- 
sane Asylum.  Attendants  were  so  neglectful  that 
their  charges  found  opportunities  to  commit  sui- 
cide; some  of  the  patients  died  from  starvation, 
others  from  violent  brutality.  A  father  named 
August  Herzbekg  came  to  the  asylum  to  visit 


82         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

his  son,  and  was  treated  to  the  spectacle  of  see- 
ing four  attendants  attack  the  boy  and  tear 
nearly  all  the  clothes  from  his  body,  after  which 
they  knocked  him  down  and  kneeled  on  his  stom- 
ach, accusing  him  of  concealing  some  trivial  ar- 
ticle. 

At  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century,  the  con- 
servative Secretary  Wines,  of  the  State  Board 
of  Charities,  thus  described  the  condition  of  the 
insane  in  Illinois: 

They  are  sometimes  chained  to  the  benches  and  to 
the  floors;  penned  up  in  pens  without  any  doors,  hut 
only  having  holes  in  the  wall  thru  which  to  pass  food 
and  water;  kept  locked  up  in  solitary  rooms  for  years, 
without  going  out  or  setting  foot  on  the  grou/nd.  The 
keepers  intimidate  them  by  brute  force.  Pistols  are 
sometinfies  fired  over  their  heads. 

In  what  respect  does  this  picture  differ  from 
the  one  that  Esquirol  drew  at  the  beginning  of 
the  century,  when  he  wrote  to  the  Minister  of  the 
Interior: 

Nude  were  the  lunatics  I  saw,  covered  with  rags, 
stretched  on  the  pavement,  a  little  straw  to  defend 
them  from  tJie  damp  cold.  I  saw  them  grossly  fed, 
deprived  of  air   to   breathe,   of  water   to  slake  their 


,    Medicine  Under  King  Mike  88 

thirst,  and  of  things  necessary  to  life.  I  saw  them 
convmitted  into  the  hands  of  whippers,  a  prey  to  their 
brutality. 

Upon  reaching  manhood's  estate,  after  mature 
reflection,  Shoual  Vail  Clevenger  had  de- 
cided to  abandon  his  profession  of  engineer  and 
become  a  physician  in  order  to  escape  the  politi- 
cal criminal,  and  by  a  trick  of  fate  he  found  him- 
self the  crony  of  drunkards,  gamblers,  burglars, 
ravishers,  murderers.  He  had  eluded  Captain 
HowGATE,  but  bumped  into  the  arms  of  Mike 
JNIcDoNALD. 

There  was  one  day  in  the  year  when  Mike 
McDonald  and  Buck  McCaethy  and  Haery 
Varnell  shone  in  especial  strength  and  splendor 
— election  day.  By  working  hard  that  day  they 
lived  in  ease  for  the  days  to  come.  There  was 
a  young  Jewish  dreamer  who  had  imagined  that 
when  all  the  people  won  the  franchise  and 
marched  to  the  polls,  each  citizen  expressing 
himself  by  ballot,  the  dawn  of  democracy  and 
the  triumph  of  justice  would  tread  on  their  heels 
— the  end  of  demagogues  and  tyrants,  the  era  of 
the  Brotherhood  of  Man.  But  if  practical  poli- 
ticians ever  heard  of  Ferdinand  Lasalle,  they 
must  have  laughed  his  pipe-dreams  to  scorn.    At 


84         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

the  back  door  of  IMike's  saloon,  in  the  alley,  was 
a  voting-shed  with  a  little  window  cut  out  of 
boards;  during  the  general  elections  in  Chicago 
the  citizens  passed  thru  the  crooked  lane,  hold- 
ing up  their  ballots  and  a  hand  collected  them. 
The  owner  of  the  hand  was  invisible,  but  who- 
ever he  was,  he  could  have  informed  the  father 
of  social  democracy  how  candidates  are  elected. 

On  the  fateful  November  morning  of  the  year 
1884  the  bosses  got  ready  to  round  up  their  herds 
of  cattle.  Mike  McDonald  issued  orders  from 
his  gambling-dive,  Buck  McCarthy  polished 
his  fists,  and  Harry  Varnell  gave  his  revolver 
a  love- tap.  The  warden  had  a  congenial  task 
before  him :  to  make  the  suburbs  of  Chicago  vote 
one  way — his  way.  In  the  second  precinct  of 
Norwood  Park  there  registered  a  total  of  129 
voters,  but  under  Varnell's  adroit  management 
225  votes  were  cast,  207  for  his  ticket.  Among 
the  exponents  of  higher  mathematics,  a  W.  H. 
Frogart,  known  to  local  fame  as  Cracker  Bill, 
excited  the  admiration  of  the  gang  by  the  num- 
ber of  times  he  re-voted.  Paupers  from  the  poor- 
house,  and  the  insane  from  the  asylum,  were 
brought  to  the  polls  to  increase  the  ballots,  and 
as  Varnell  had  not  erudition  enough  to  invent 
aliases  for  all  of  them,  they  were  registered  un- 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  85 

der  the  cognomen  of*  sonic  Clii(!;igo  cclcbi-ity,  as 
Pat  Carhoi.,  Austin  Doyi.k,  Mike  McDonald, 
Henry  Donovan. 

It  might  be  presumed  that  with  legitimate  vot- 
ers and  tax-j)ayers  it  was  found  necessary  to 
adopt  more  subtle  and  refined  methods  than  were 
employed  with  beggars  and  lunatics,  but  Var- 
NEiJi  knew  only  the  methods  of  intimidation  and 
fraud.  Early  in  the  day  an  honest  old  farmer, 
Herman  Schroeder,  cast  his  ballot,  number 
155,  and  went  home;  later  another  vote  was  de- 
posited in  his  name,  number  176.  The  vote  of 
Joseph  Koenig,  also  a  farmer,  was  cast  out  with- 
out any  adequate  cause.  An  assistant  engineer 
under  Mr  Kavanaugh  voted  according  to  his 
convictions,  and  was  discharged.  Richard  Sus- 
siCK,  a  laundryman  at  the  infirmary,  possessed  a 
political  creed  that  was  not  above  suspicion— in 
fact  he  belonged  to  the  opposite  party.  Var- 
NELL  watched  Sussick  when  he  voted,  and  said 
to  J.  K.  Beatty,  'Keep  track  of  that  vote;  I 
w^ant  to  see  it  when  the  count  is  made,' — it  was 
before  the  Australian  ballot.  Now  Dick  Sus- 
sick was  no  plimied  hero;  he  was  a  laundryman 
who  wanted  to  keep  his  job,  and  he  voted  Var- 
nell's  waj^  Dr  Cle^t^nger  also  was  threatened 
with  expulsion  if  he  did  not  vote  according  to 


86         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

directions,  but  the  ward  heeler  Lee  doubted  if 
he  would  be  obedient.  E.  D.  Smith,  an  old  resi- 
dent of  Norwood  Park,  was  incensed  at  the 
wholesale  bulldozing.  'Things  have  come  to  a 
pretty  pass,'  he  remarked  to  Varnell,  'when 
in  this  enlightened  section  of  the  country  a  man 
can't  vote  as  he  pleases.'  'I  don't  propose,'  re- 
plied Varnell,  angrily,  'that  any  man  who  eats 
bread  and  butter  under  me  shall  vote  any  other 
ticket.'  Such  was  the  boasted  freedom  of  the 
American  voter. 

In  the  corral  there  was  hardly  a  decent  kick. 
One  after  the  other  the  victims  stepped  meekly 
forward  to  be  branded  by  Varnell's  iron.  It 
was  now  seen  why  he  had  been  made  warden — 
he  was  a  handy  man  for  the  gang.  Then  came 
the  surprise.  Some  one  was  untamed  and  un- 
lassoed,  some  one  had  proved  balky  and  was 
rearing  high,  allowing  no  rider  on  his  back.  The 
loafers  in  Mike's  saloon  put  down  their  beer 
glasses  and  listened.  It  was  unbelievable,  but 
there  it  was — in  the  first  column  of  the  third  page 
of  the  Chicago  Inter  Ocean.  It  was  headed  Ap- 
peal to  Physicians,  and  spoke  of  the  numberless 
outrages  against  the  patients  that  the  politicians 
in  charge  had  been  committing  for  years,  and 
urged  all  honest  men  to  be  sure  that  the  county 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  87 

commissioners  for  whom  they  voted  bore  no  al- 
legiance to  these  gamblers  and  thieves.  In  those 
days  it  was  dangerous  to  be  a  reformer  in  Chi- 
cago ;  either  he  was  privately  stabbed  in  the  back 
and  thrown  in  a  sewer,  as  happened  to  Dr  P. 
Ckonin,  of  the  Clan-na-gael,  when  he  proved 
that  Alexander  Sullivan  was  gambling  away 
on  the  board  of  trade  the  patriotic  money  that 
had  been  collected  to  liberate  Ireland;  or  else 
the  agitator  was  legally  executed,  as  happened 
to  labor  leaders  like  Albert  Parsons  and  Au- 
gust Spies.  The  man  who  wrote  the  Appeal  to 
Physicians  and  affixed  his  signature  to  it  was  the 
bravest  man  in  Chicago,  and  the  name  that  it 
bore  was  S.  V.  Clevenger,  M.D. 

That  night  a  bullet  came  crashing  thru  his 
room,  narrowly  missing  his  wife  and  daughter, 
breaking  a  pane  of  his  book-case,  and  lodging 
in  a  volume  of  Gegenbaur's  Comparative  Anat- 
omy. As  Clevenger  could  not  afford  to  lose 
his  valuable  books  in  this  manner,  he  resigned 
his  position.  Never  again  was  there  a  special 
pathologist  at  the  Cook  County  Insane  Asylum. 

Dr  Clevenger  was  by  no  means  the  first  phy- 
sician who  walked  out  of  the  asylum  because  of 
political  corruption.  Some  years  previous,  three 
reputable      neurologists — Professors      Jewell, 


88         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Brower  and  Lyman — were  connected  with  the 
asylum;  as  soon  as  they  clashed  with  the  ring 
they  escaped  from  Dunning,  quickly  and  quietly, 
and  rarely  alluded  to  their  experiences.  These 
men  were  good  in  imparting  text-book  knowl- 
edge and  in  preparing  students  for  examinations 
— they  were  not  reformers.  But  in  Dr  Cleven- 
GER  the  gang  found  a  different  species  of  the 
genus  homo.  Armed  with  evidence,  bitter  with 
indignation,  eager  for  justice,  Clevenger  vowed 
not  to  rest  until  he  had  exposed  the  county  com- 
missioners. 

He  procured  affidavits  from  various  individ- 
uals testifying  to  the  outrages  they  had  wit- 
nessed. Clevenger  tried  to  induce  the  Union 
League  to  listen  to  this  material,  but  the  director 
was  'just  going  away  on  his  vacation.'  Cleven- 
ger left  a  statement  of  abuses  with  the  secretary 
of  the  Chicago  Citizens'  Association,  and  that 
enterprising  individual  copied  the  accusations, 
and  sent  them — to  Mike  McDonald.  Cleven- 
ger appointed  a  committee  of  the  Chicago  Medi- 
cal Society  to  investigate  the  matter,  but  its 
members  either  compromised  with  the  politicians 
or  grew  luke-warm — all  except  sturdy  old  Dr 
Paoli,  who  fought  against  the  asylum  clique  as 
vigorously  as  he  fought  in  favor  of  his  two  hob- 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  89 

bies:  women  in  medicine,  and  the  freethonght 
propaganda  of  Tom  Paine  and  Bob  Inqersoi.l. 
Mrs  Shedd  and  Mrs  ITenrotin,  faithful  as  ever, 
headed  a  reform  group,  and  Ci-evenger  urged 
the  Women's  Chib  to  help  in  the  crusade;  they 
gave  him  a  pink  tea,  and  the  wives  and  daugh- 
ters of  Chicago's  successful  business  men  listened 
to  his  recital  of  horrors,  and  smilingly  told  him 
they  enjoyed  his  lecture  very  much — it  was  more 
interesting  than  the  minister's  description  of  the 
scenery  of  Palestine.  Everywhere  Clevenger 
found  these  sloughs  of  unconcern  that  dampened 
his  hopes.  He  appealed  to  preachers  of  various 
denominations,  but  they  'declined  to  discuss  poli- 
tics in  the  pulpit.' 

At  last  the  popular  Rev.  David  Swing  agreed 
to  bring  the  woes  of  the  county  asylum  before 
his  large  congregation;  his  sermons  were  re- 
ported in  the  JNIonday  papers,  and  Clevenger 
bought  a  copy  of  the  Inter  Ocean,  anxiously 
turning  to  the  second  page  where  Dr  Swing's 
eloquence  filled  three  columns.  In  the  first,  he 
spoke  of  Noah  and  Elijah,  of  the  oaks  of  Dodona 
and  the  raving  Sibyl,  of  the  dog  Cerberus  and 
the  Golden  Fleece,  of  Queen  Mab  and  Paradise 
Lost,  of  Aladdin's  lamp  and  the  ruins  of  CaXyp- 
so's  grotto,  of  Adam  and  Eve  and  the  council 


90         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

where  Satan  went  as  the  ambassador  of  evil,  of 
the  Ides  of  March  and  the  idea  of  the  Trinity — 
one  topic  had  no  connexion  with  another,  but 
the  pastor  of  the  flock  had  to  show  off  his  clas- 
sical knowledge;  in  the  second  column  he  men- 
tioned perhaps  half  the  names  that  are  found 
in  the  index  of  Taine's  History  of  English  Lit- 
er attire — the  Rev.  David  Swing  was  certainly  a 
learned  gentleman;  in  the  third  column  he  ex- 
citedly asked  if  the  imagination  was  dying,  and 
with  many  exclamation  points  and  ejaculatory 
remarks  he  proved  it  was  not,  far  from  it,  on 
the  contrary.  But  what  had  he  said  about  the 
atrocities  at  the  asylum  ?  Amid  his  flowery  apos- 
trophes he  had  uttered  this  line:  'To  the  di- 
ploma of  medical  science  must  be  added  one 
signed  by  the  merciful  name  of  Jesus  Christ.' 
Three  columns  of  inane  twaddle,  while  Cleven- 
GER  had  expected  that  Swing  would  risk  his 
popularity  by  attacking  current  conditions.  O 
Simple  Simon — as  Hilgard  warned  you  in 
Washington:  Go  home. 

Clevenger  wrote  article  after  article  for  the 
newspapers,  and  the  editors  wore  out  their  blue 
pencils  and  overfilled  their  waste-paper  baskets. 
Several  times  his  life  was  in  peril;  he  received 
requests  to  make  night-calls  in  neighborhoods 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  91 

where  he  previously  had  no  patients.  He  was 
about  to  go,  but  on  second  thought  decided  to 
let  Roiu^irr  Bruce  go  instead.  15oijijy  was  a  pri- 
vate detective  who  tried  hard  to  get  some  excite- 
ment out  of  modern  life  by  drinking  to  excess, 
by  brandishing  a  revolver,  and  by  mixing  up  in 
mysteries;  he  wounded  a  man  in  a  boarding 
house,  slew  the  proprietor  of  a  saloon,  and  spent 
a  year  in  prison,  but  otherwise  was  an  honest  and 
reliable  fellow,  except  when  drunk.  On  his  let- 
ter-heads was  a  radiant  eye  beneath  the  motto 
Fides  et  Justitia,  while  at  the  side  a  spider  was 
spinning  a  web  above  the  maxim.  We  never  give 
up.  Bruce  investigated  the  'patient,'  found 
there  was  no  such  person  at  the  address  given, 
but  that  two  tough  politicians,  Gleeson  and 
Ryan,  had  concocted  a  plot  to  pounce  upon  the 
doctor  and  *do  him  up.'  He  further  discovered 
that  the  engineer  Kavanaugh  offered  a  former 
convict  $100  if  he  would  kill  Cle^tenger.  These 
were  Clevenger's  rewards:  stupidity,  misunder- 
standing, laughter,  threats.  One  poor  man 
against  a  powerful  clique — ^mountains  of  discour- 
agement rose  in  his  path. 

Yet  somehow,  some  way,  somewhere,  there 
came  a  turning  of  the  tide.  The  accumulated 
evidence  overflowed  the  high  banks  of  indiffer- 


92         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ence.  From  all  sides  witnesses  poured  in,  add- 
ing fresh  tales  to  Clevenger's  accusations.  As 
the  testimony  proceeded,  it  involved  merchants 
whose  reputations  were  considered  untarnished. 
Governor  Oglesby  summoned  the  State  Board 
of  Charities  to  investigate  the  situation. 

In  the  crowded  court  room  Clevenger  met 
the  county  commissioners: 

'Did  you  ever  see  me  at  the  asylum  in  an  in- 
toxicated condition?'  asked  Comjnissioner  Van 
Pelt. 

'Yes,  sir,'  answered  Clevenger. 

'How  drunk,  please?' 

'So  drunk  you  could  not  navigate.' 

'Did  you  ever  see  me  at  the  dances  at  the 
asylum?' 

'Yes,  sir,  I  have.' 

'Was  I  drunk?' 

'You  were.' 

'Was  I  accompanied  by  disreputable  women?' 

'You  mingled  with  women  who  were  boister- 
ous and  slangy.' 

'How  did  I  act?' 

'Disgi'aceful.' 

Commissioner  Wassermann  then  mounted  the 
stand : 

'Did  you  ever  see  me  drunk  at  the  asylum?' 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  98 

'Yes,  sir.' 

'Did  you  ever  see  Commissioner  Ochs  drunk 
at  the  institution?' 

'No,  sir,  not  Commissioner  Ochs.' 

'Commissioner  IIannigan  ?' 

'Repeatedly;  I  seldom  saw  him  sober.' 

The  commissioners  had  devised  this  meeting 
with  Clevenger,  thinking  he  would  not  dare  at- 
tack them  to  their  faces — but  this  was  the  time 
that  they  miscalcidated.  Why,  even  the  plans 
of  the  Hon.  Michael  McDonald  sometimes 
went  astray;  for  instance,  Mike  did  not  care  to 
cross  the  ocean,  but  he  wished  to  enjoy  the  beau- 
ties of  Paris,  so  he  visited  a  French  woman  until 
it  was  time  to  save  her  good  name;  thereupon 
Mike  offered  a  policeman  several  thousand  dol- 
lars, a  house  on  Washington  Boulevard,  and  a 
city  position  for  life  if  he  would  marry  the  trans- 
planted Parisienne  and  father  the  forthcoming 
child;  the  limb  of  the  law  accepted  the  offer;  it 
was  a  clever  plan,  but  alas — when  the  baby  girl 
grew  up  she  resembled  INIike,  nose  and  mouth 
and  eyes,  and  she  smiled  sweetly,  just  like  her 
daddy. 

But  where  was  Mike  during  the  troublous 
days  that  the  alarmed  commissioners  were  be- 
ing pelted  by  the  muckrakers  ?    He  and  his  f am- 


94         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ily  were  down  south,  enjoying  the  palmettos  of 
Asheville,  North  Carolina — till  Mike's  vacation 
was  cut  short  by  a  telegram  in  cipher.  The 
dapper  boss  hastened  to  the  asylum,  burnt  the 
books  and  records,  and  lit  a  cigarette.  The  worst 
was  over — now  let  the  prosecution  proceed. 
Thruout  the  trial,  confessed  his  wife,  nightly  con- 
ferences took  place  in  the  mansion  of  the  master 
boodler. 

The  callers  used  to  sit  there  and  wrangle  un- 
til after  midnight,  and  the  loud  talk  would  reach 
the  room  upstairs  where  Mrs  McDonald  was 
sitting,  and  often  she  would  come  down  and  warn 
them  to  lower  their  voices — Bob  Bruce  might  be 
eavesdropping.  Father  Leyden,  brother  of  the 
implicated  commissioner,  was  there;  and  the 
wives  of  Dan  Wren  and  Harry  Varnell 
frequently  spoke  of  their  husbands  to  Mrs 
McDonald.  Of  course  the  ringsters  came,  noisy 
as  ever,  drinking,  smoking,  swearing.  But  there 
was  another  class  of  visitors — men  who  were  sup- 
posed to  be  above  reproach,  whose  names  were 
good  for  untold  sums  along  State  street,  and 
they  were  pleading  before  Mike  as  if  for  their 
lives.  Mrs  McDonald,  according  to  her  own 
words,  had  seen  hundreds  of  men  unnerved  by 
drink  and  losses  at  play,  but  in  those  few  months 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  95 

she  heard  more  lords  of  creation  hreak  down  and 
sob  than  in  all  her  previous  interesting  career. 
As  she  neatly  expressed  it:  'They'd  been  bood- 
ling — that  was  all — and  they  didn't  want  to  be 
caught.'  One  night  she  opened  the  door  for  a 
prominent  merchant — she  blackmailed  him  later 
to  keep  his  name  secret — and  she  saw  he  was  in 
tears;  two  hours  later  he  came  out  of  Mike's 
room,  smiling.  He  noticed  the  chief's  wife  sit- 
ting near  the  hallway,  and  he  said  to  her :  'We're 
thinking  of  running  Mr  McDonald  for  mayor 
in  the  spring,  Mrs  McDonald.' 

But  the  slick  grafters  could  no  longer  make 
Chicago  smile.  From  everywhere  arose  a  cry 
of  wrath.  Those  Chicagoans  who  were  in  the 
habit  of  reading  their  newspapers  at  breakfast 
had  to  swallow  a  lot  of  dirt  with  their  morning 
coiFee.  The  Tribune,  Daily  News,  Inter  Ocean, 
Herald,  Times,  united  in  a  chorus  of  denuncia- 
tion. 

'The  county  commissioners,'  wrote  one  of  the 
leading  papers,  'are  blackguards  who  have  pros- 
tituted their  trust  by  making  a  pot-house  of  the 
Insane  Asylum  and  insulted  honest  idiocy  by 
flaunting  Jezebels.  Their  disgusting  crimes, 
perpetrated  at  the  public  expense,  are  not  likely 
to  be  the  subject  of  legal  investigation  with  a 


96         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

view  to  punishment,  for  they  themselves  make 
the  grand  juries  whose  duty  it  is  to  examine  into 
the  management  of  county  institutions.  And  the 
guzzHng,  lying,  thieving  rascals  of  commission- 
ers kept  the  public  jug  for  the  benefit  of  those 
jurors.' 

But  at  last  the  boodlers  had  overstepped  the 
limits  of  the  city's  tolerance.  They  had  stolen 
too  much — ten  million  dollars  within  a  few  years 
— and  by  their  cruelties  they  made  Chicago  blush 
for  its  reputation.  'The  story  is  a  terrible  one 
to  go  to  the  public  outside  of  Chicago,'  said  the 
Inter  Ocean.  'Does  a  condition  of  affairs  exist 
in  the  Cook  County  Insane  Asylum  which  would 
disgrace  an  African  slave-kraal  ?'  asked  the  Daily 
News. 

So  State's  Attorney  Julius  S.  Grinnell 
saw  his  opportunity;  he  instituted  proceedings 
against  the  county  crooks — 'the  omnibus  bood- 
lers' bill'  was  on  its  way.  We  must  immediately 
acquit  the  wide-awake  State's  Attorney  of  any 
humanitarian  motives;  Grinnell  was  interested 
exclusively  in  Grinnell;  he  was  a  'get-there 
Eli,'  but  he  knew  his  business,  and  the  verdict 
that  he  secured  was  one  terrible  word:  guilty. 

Commissioner  Hannigan  escaped  to  Canada, 
but  those  of  his  fellow  boodlers  who  were  not  so 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  97 

fleet  of  foot  were  put  behind  stone  walls  and  iron 
bars.  Harry  Varnkli.  and  Van  Pelt  were 
among  those  convicted.  It  was  April  when  little 
Van  Pelt  passed  into  the  prison-yard  at  Joliet; 
he  looked  up  at  the  trees  laden  with  springtinne 
buds,  and  he  said,  'The  leaves  are  coming  out — 
I  wish  I  was  a  leaf.'  Even  a  county  grafter  may 
have  a  glimjise  of  the  Tennysonian  soul. 

The  law  left  Mike  McDonald  alone,  but  his 
wives  were  his  ruin.  Mike's  first  wife  ran  away 
with  a  minstrel-man ;  Mike  went  after  them,  and 
he  didn't  kill  Billy,  and  he  brought  his  wife 
back.  She  was  extremely  devout,  and  for  her 
sake  Mike  built  a  private  confessional  in  their 
home,  and  took  in  a  priest  for  her  personal  use. 
Within  a  year  she  developed  such  piety  that  she 
and  the  Raphael-faced  priest  eloped  to  New 
York — accompanied  by  Mr  McDonald's  dia- 
monds. This  time  Mike  did  not  follow  the 
mother  of  his  children;  he  went  to  a  certain  sa- 
loonkeeper and  bought  his  wife  from  him.  The 
original  Mrs  INIcDonald  did  not  find  love  and 
religion  profitable  in  Manhattan;  her  tonsured 
swain  appropriated  her  property  and  disap- 
peared. She  wrote  to  her  son  Williajvi  for 
money,  admitting  she  was  destitute.  The  boy 
brought  the  letter  to  his  father;  JNIike  rested  his 


98         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

chin  in  his  hand,  rubbed  it  a  little,  and  said 
quietly,  'Will,  she's  your  mother.'  She  received 
the  funds,  returned  to  Chicago,  and  visited  mil- 
lionaire merchants,  threatening  to  expose  their 
transactions  with  Mike — unless  hush-money  was 
forthcoming.  Later  she  invaded  the  red-light 
district  and  opened  an  assignation-house.  Once 
she  was  in  the  saloon  at  121  South  Clark  street 
— in  other  days  it  had  belonged  to  Mike — and  a 
quarrel  arose;  she  was  familiar  with  the  place, 
and  she  put  her  revolver  thru  a  small  spyhole  in 
the  wall  and  shot  one  of  the  gamblers.  She  went 
out  by  the  back  door  and  was  never  brought  to 
trial.  JMiKE^s  second  mate  was  also  a  sport: 
she  entered  the  studio  of  her  artist-lover  and 
killed  him.  She,  too,  escaped  prosecution ;  a  Mrs 
McDonald  was  safe  in  Cook  County.  Life  is 
a  gamble;  many  a  worthless  pander  has  won  the 
slavish  faithfulness  of  women,  while  Mike  the 
mighty,  who  bossed  an  army  of  men  and  used  the 
County  of  Cook  as  his  backyard,  and  was  the 
warmest-hearted  fellow  in  his  crowd,  couldn't 
keep  the  devotion  of  a  couple  of  strumpets. 
These  domestic  difficulties  took  the  joy  out  of 
life,  and  he  died  a  broken-hearted  millionaire. 

But  even  before  he  left  the  streets  of  Chicago 
forever,  he  ceased  to  be  a  power  in  politics.  Mike 


CLEVENGER,  in  1888 


CLEVEXGER,  in  1892 


Medicine  Under  King  Mike  99 

allowed  his  lieutenant,  Joseph  Mackin — Gen- 
tleman Joe  and  Chesterfield  Joe,  the  gang  ealled 
him — to  serve  a  prison  term  for  an  election  con- 
spiracy, and  bitter  feelings  were  brewed  in  the 
political  pot.  Later,  Mike  played  another  un- 
forgivable trick:  to  secure  the  franchise  for  a 
long  elevated  route  it  was  necessary  that  an  ordi- 
nance be  passed  by  the  city  council,  and  in  the 
presence  of  forty  aldermen  Mike  wrote  forty 
names  on  forty  envelopes,  placed  a  thousand-dol- 
lar bill  within  each  and  handed  the  precious 
packet  across  the  counter  to  a  trustworthy  bar- 
tender. Forty  men  hastened  away  to  vote  for 
Mike's  franchise,  and  forty  men  hastened  back 
to  receive  their  reward;  they  called  for  their  en- 
velopes, tore  them  open,  and  each  found  a  dollar 
bill.  The  city  council  was  enraged;  mutiny 
awoke  within  Mike's  camp,  and  encompassed  by 
enemies,  the  chieftain  fell;  politicians  arose  on 
Clark  street  who  knew  him  not.  Thus  ended  the 
reign  of  King  ^Iike. 

In  the  city  of  Chicago  are  many  statues,  but 
somewhere  in  her  nmiierous  parks  or  along  her 
ample  boulevards  is  space  for  one  more :  a  monu- 
ment should  be  erected  to  Dr  Shobai.  Vail 
Cle^^engek,  the  pioneer  anti-boodler  of  the  state 
of  Illinois. 


IV 
THE  KANKAKEE  AFFAIR 

CLEVENGER'S  adventures  in  jurispru- 
dence did  not  terminate  with  his  retirement 
from  Dunning.  The  special  pathologist  was 
metamorphosed  into  an  expert,  and  his  services 
were  requisitioned  in  spinal  concussion  and  in- 
sanity issues — at  the  rate  of  one  hundred  dollars 
a  day.  During  his  career  as  an  alienist  he  was 
summoned  to  Ohio,  Wisconsin,  Nebraska,  Iowa, 
Indiana  and  Pennsylvania,  tho  naturally  most 
of  his  cases  were  in  Chicago. 

Back  in  the  thirties,  Isaac  Ray  wrote  the 
Medical  Jurisprudence  of  Insanity,  thus  open- 
ing the  darkest  chapter  in  American  medicine. 
Juridical  medicine  is  a  hybrid  incapable  of  any 
virtue.  Unfortunately,  it  is  medicine  and  not 
the  law  that  suffers  in  this  instance.  Trans- 
planted from  his  clinic,  confused  in  the  meshes 
of  the  hypothetical  question,  heckled  by  some 
'smart  lawyer,'  the  physician  usually  makes  an 
ass  of  himself.    But  this  is  by  no  means  the  worst. 

100 


The  Kankakee  A  fair  101 

The  law-court  has  hecomc  an  auction-block 
where  medical  experts  sell  themselves  to  the 
highest  bidder.  The  side  that  has  money  to  spare 
can  procure  the  number  of  experts  it  wants,  and 
just  the  sort  of  testimony  it  wants.  Much  of 
the  disrepute  into  which  our  profession  has  fallen 
is  due  to  the  alienist. 

Chicago's  most  brilliant  lunatic — Frank  Col- 
lier— listened  to  Dr  Kiernan  attempting  to 
prove  him  insane.  Coli>ier,  who  was  a  lawyer, 
conducted  his  own  defence,  and  began  to  cross- 
examine  Kiernan.  Within  a  few  minutes  the 
expert  was  floundering  helplessly  in  a  bottomless 
swamp  of  misstatements  and  contradictions. 
They  argued  about  paresis,  and  the  layman 
showed  a  more  intimate  acquaintance  with  the 
subject  than  the  alienist.  The  attorney  tripped 
and  trapped  the  doctor,  and  got  him  so  rattled 
and  excited,  that  it  looked  very  much  as  if  the 
squirming  Kiernan  and  not  the  self-possessed 
Collier  was  the  insane  man.  'Easy  now,  easy 
now,  doctor,'  cautioned  Collier,  'you  are  exhib- 
iting the  very  symptoms  that  you  are  charging 
against  me.'  Collier  later  wrote  an  article  in 
which  he  declared  Kiernan  had  the  dress  of  a 
Zulu,  the  manners  of  a  Patagonian,  and  the  face 
of  an  orang-outang. 


102       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

.  Cle^'enger  was  likewise  called  upon  to  testify 
in  this  remarkable  case,  but  no  Kiernanistic  ca- 
lamities befell  him.  On  the  witness-stand  he  was 
genial,  alert,  frank ;  his  answers  showed  an  exten- 
sive acquaintance  with  the  practice  and  literature 
of  psychiatry,  but  he  never  pretended  to  omnis- 
cience, was  willing  enough  to  say,  'I  don't  know,' 
and  thus  was  not  discomfited.  Clevenger  could 
have  been  a  successful  alienist — if  conditions  in 
the  courts  were  different.  But  since  even  such 
a  hardened  defender  of  Things-as-They-Are  as 
Allan  McLane  Hamilton  finds  it  necessary 
to  condemn  the  present  system  of  expert-testi- 
mony, it  is  not  surprising  that  the  soul  of  Clev- 
enger revolted  against  this  'degi-aded  expert 
business,'  to  quote  his  own  bitter  phrase. 

In  1893  there  came  an  unexpected  change  in 
the  affairs  of  Dr  Clevenger.  In  that  year,  for 
the  second  time,  Mr  Cleveland  was  elected 
president  of  the  United  States;  Grover  Cleve- 
land was  one  of  the  men  the  author  of  The 
American  Commonwealth  had  in  mind  when  he 
wrote  his  chapter,  'Why  great  men  are  not 
chosen  presidents.'  But  the  Cleveland  land- 
slide brought  a  man  of  another  stamp  into  the 
executive  chair  of  Illinois — John  P.  Altgeld. 
Wading  across  the  filthy  morass  of  American 


The  Kankakee  Affair  103 

politics  have  been  a  i'aw  clean  spirits,  such  as 
IIenry  Geokge  and  Gohlen  Rule  Jones.  To 
this  small  group  Governor  Altgeed  belongs. 
That  he  was  a  politician  cannot  be  denied;  he 
knew  how  to  sling  the  buncombe.  'I  like  Chicago,' 
he  told  a  Chicago  audience  at  the  Auditorium. 
'I  would  rather  be  a  private  citizen  in  Chicago, 
standing  around  on  the  street-corners  with  my 
hands  in  my  pockets,  than  be  the  greatest  poten- 
tate on  earth  somewhere  else.'  (Applause.) 
But  there  was  another  side  to  Ai.tgeld.  His 
book  Live  Questions  proves  him  to  have  been  no 
vulgar  partyite;  portions  of  it  might  have  been 
signed  by  John  Stuart  Mill  or  by  August 
Bebel. 

During  Altgeld's  administration  occurred  the 
great  Pullman  strike,  in  which  Eugene  V.  Debs 
gained  prominence  and  six  months  in  jail;  the 
president  of  the  United  States  was  for  calling 
out  the  federal  troops,  but  the  governor  of  Illi- 
nois, with  finer  intelligence,  protested,  'Hands 
off.' 

In  one  of  the  state  prisons  Altgeld  found 
three  men — the  remnants  of  an  effort  to  improve 
the  fate  of  workingmen  at  a  time  when  con- 
ditions were  unbearable,  and  when  police  of- 
ficers like  Captain  Bonfield  behaved  as  bru- 


10^       The  Don  Quivote  of  Psychiatry 

tally  as  Cossacks  under  the  Romanoffs. 
After  repression,  the  explosion;  there  was  a  riot 
on  Haymarket  Square,  a  policeman  named  De- 
GAN  was  killed  by  a  bomb  thrown  by  an  unknown 
person,  a  fusillade  of  bullets  was  fired  at  random 
into  the  crowd,  and  the  law  laid  its  hand  on  eight 
agitators — August  Spies,  Louis  Lingg,  Al- 
bert Parsons,  Adolf  Fischer,  George  En- 
gel,  Michael  Schwab,  Samuel  Fielden,  Os- 
car Neebe.  Their  ringing  speeches  in  court 
should  have  aroused  the  hosts  of  labor,  but  in- 
stead of  a  glorious  awakening,  Chicago — goaded 
on  by  the  ever-vicious  press — stained  itself  with 
the  unforgettable  crime  of  November  11,  1887; 
on  that  black  day  the  gallows  turned  Albert 
Parsons,  August  Spies,  George  Engel  and 
Adolf  Fischer  into  martyrs.  Louis  Lingg,  the 
youngest  and  most  picturesque  of  the  group,  was 
likewise  scheduled  for  slaughter,  but  his  sweet- 
heart gave  him  a  dynamite  cartridge  for  a  fare- 
well gift,  and  he  bit  the  souvenir  between  his 
teeth  and  blew  his  intrepid  head  across  his  cell. 
The  innocent  Fielden,  Schwab  and  Neebe 
were  sentenced  to  Joliet  State  Prison,  and  there 
Altgeld  found  them  after  seven  years  of  in- 
carceration— and  liberated  them.  His  Reasons 
for  Pardoning,  proving  that  the  anarchists  were 


The  Kankakee  Affair  10.5 

sent  to  their  doom  by  a  packed  jury  and  corrupt 
judge  without  evidence,  constitutes  the  most 
masterly  defence  of  freedom  that  ever  issued 
from  the  gubernatorial  chambers  at  Springfield. 
Altgeli)  thus  became  the  only  official  who 
earned  a  tribute  of  gratitude  from  that  fiery 
poetess  of  discontent,  Voltairine  de  Cleyre: 

There  was  a  tableau !     Liberty's  clear  light 

Shone  never  on  a  braver  scene  than  that. 

Here  was  a  prison,  there  a  man  who  sat 

High  in  the  halls   of  state !     Beyond,  the   might 

Of   ignorance   and   mobs,   whose   hireling  press 

Yells   at  their  bidding  like  the  slaver's  hounds, 

Ready  with  coarse  caprice  to  curse  or  bless, 

To  make  or  unmake  rulers !     Lo,  there  sounds 

A  grating  of  the  doors !     And  three  poor  men, 

Helpless  and  hated,  having  naught  to  give. 

Come  fi'om  their  long-sealed  tomb,  look  up,  and  live, 

And  thank  this  man  that  they  are  free  again. 

And  he — to   all  the  world  this   man  dares   say, 

Curse  as  you  will!     I  have  been  just  this  day. 

The  emotion  which  Altgeld  could  inspire, 
may  be  sensed  from  one  of  those  unforgettable 
epitaphs  in  the  Spoon  Rive?'  Antliology: 

Tell  me,  was  Altgeld  elected  Governor? 
For  when  the  returns  beffan  to  come  in 


106       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

And  Cleveland  was  sweeping  the  East, 

It  was  too  much  for  you,  poor  old  heart, 

Who  had  striven  for  democracy 

In   the  long,  long  years  of  defeat. 

And  like  a  watch  that  is  worn 

I  felt  you  growing  slower  until  you  stopped. 

Tell  me,  was  Altgeld  elected. 

And  what  did  he  do? 

Did  they  bring  his  head  on  a  platter  to  a  dancer, 

Or  did  he  triumph  for  the  people.? 

For  when  I  saw  him 

And  took  his  hand, 

The  child-like  blueness   of  his  eyes 

Moved  me  to  tears. 

And  there  was  an  air  of  eternity  about  him, 

Like  the  cold,  clear  light  that  rests  at  dawn 

On  the  hiUs! 

As  governor  of  the  State  it  devolved  upon 
A1.TGELD  to  appoint  a  medical  superintendent  for 
the  Illinois  Eastern  Hospital  for  the  Insane,  at 
Kankakee — the  largest  institution  of  the  kind 
in  Illinois,  and  the  second  largest  in  the  United 
States :  40  acres  covered  with  buildings,  800  acres 
under  cultivation,  herds  of  cattle,  the  board  of 
trustees,  the  medical  superintendent  and  staff 
of  assistant  physicians,  the  business  manager,  the 
chief  clerk  and  other  clerks,  the  nurses  and  train- 


The  Kankakee  Affair  107 

ing-school  students,  the  stenographers,  the  en- 
gineers, the  plasterers,  the  brick-masons,  the 
painters,  the  male  supervisor,  the  female  super- 
visor, the  book-keeper,  the  store-keeper,  the 
watchmen,  the  300  attendants,  the  1,000  male 
patients,  the  1,000  female  inmates — it  was  a  little 
empire  of  the  insane  on  the  banks  of  the  muddy 
Kankakee. 

For  fourteen  years,  ever  since  its  foundation 
in  1879,  this  demesne  had  been  ruled  by  Dr  Rich- 
ard Dewey.  His  conduct  seemed  to  give  gen- 
eral satisfaction,  and  strong  pressure  was 
brought  to  bear  upon  Altgeld  to  allow  Dewey 
to  remain  superintendent.  But  the  governor  de- 
clared he  had  investigated  the  state  asylums,  es- 
pecially Elgin,  Jacksonville,  and  Kankakee,  and 
found  the  management  simply  rotten.  'I  am  de- 
termined to  have  some  new  blood  at  the  heads  of 
these  institutions,'  he  declared,  'and  no  amount 
of  whimpering  will  prevent  it.' 

When  Altgeld  served  as  judge  he  had  lis- 
tened to  the  testimony  of  various  alienists,  and 
had  been  particularly  impressed  with  the  exten- 
sive learning  and  broad  sjonpathy  of  one  of  these 
neurologists;  and  now  that  the  time  came  for 
Altgeld  to  choose  a  medical  superintendent  for 
the  most  important  insane  asylum  in  his  state,  he 


108       The  Don  Quivote  of  Psychiatry 

thought  of  this  man,  and  the  result  was  that  on 
the  thn-d  of  JNIarch,  1893,  a  doctor  whose  office 
was  at  70  State  street,  and  whose  sign  bore  the 
name  S.  V.  Clea^nger,  M.D.,  received  this  com- 
munication from  the  chairman  of  the  committee 
on  elections: 

1  just  came  from  the  Governor,  and  he  told  me  he 
intended  to  appoint  you  superintendent  of  the  Insane 
Hospital  at  Kankakee.  I  could  not  tell  him  whether 
you  were  a  democrat  or  not,  but  I  hope  you  are. 
Please  let  me  hear  from  you  on  that  point  and  whether 
you  will  accept  the  position  when  tendered. 

C.    Porter   Johnson. 

The  information  was  a  complete  surprise  to  Dr 
Clevenger.  During  the  past  decade  he  had  built 
up  a  fairly  lucrative  practice,  lectured  somewhat 
and  wrote  much,  attended  to  his  duties  at  the 
Michael  Reese  and  Alexian  Brothers  hospitals, 
appeared  frequently  in  court — at  other  men's 
trials — kept  out  of  politics,  and  had  no  thoughts 
of  connecting  himself  with  a  public  asylum.  The 
request  was  flattering,  but  it  was  also  disturbing. 
He  was  on  friendly  terms  with  Richard  Dewey, 
and  refused  to  displace  him;  only  when  Dr 
Dewey  wrote  that  his  relations  with  Kankakee 
had  already  been  severed  by  the  political  ax  did 


The  Kankakee  Affair  109 

CiiEVENGER  begin  to  consider  the  matter.  How 
to  dispose  of  his  practice  and  furniture  was  an- 
other problem,  but  Clevencjer  was  accustomed 
to  moving,  and  decided  he  would  go  to  Kan- 
kakee. 

Every  newspaper  in  Chicago  printed  the  news, 
and  some  shed  tears  at  Dewey's  dismissal,  while 
others  praised  the  governor's  choice.  After  the 
announcement  in  the  press,  Clevenger  received 
congratulations  from  various  sorts  of  men,  rang- 
ing all  the  way  from  E.  D.  Cope,  one  of  the  glo- 
ries of  American  science,  down  to  T.  S.  Ajl- 
BRIGHT,  a  boodling  ex-county  commissioner. 

It  is  curious  to  note  that  one  of  Clevenger's 
friends,  Alfred  C.  Girard,  major  and  surgeon 
in  the  United  States  Army — he  has  since  become 
a  general — sent  regrets  instead  of  congratula- 
tions : 

I  wanted  to  write  you  when  I  first  received  the  news- 
papers announcing  your  probable  appointment  and 
then  the  accomplished  fact.  I  wanted  to  say  to  you 
that  I  saw  this  change  in  your  fortunes  with  regret, 
for  two  reasons.  First,  I  am  satisfied  that  you  will 
be  so  crowded  with  administrative  business  that  you 
will  necessarily  drop  back  from  your  advanced  posi- 
tion as  an  investigator,  and  secondly,  this  appointment 


110       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

depends  greatly  on  the  good  pleasure  of  some  political 
party,  and  when  sooner  or  later  you  will  have  to  try 
to  regain  your  position  in  private  practice,  you  will 
find  the  berth  occupied  by  numbers  of  men,  who  mean- 
while have  won  the  confidence  of  the  public,  but  who 
wovdd  not  have  attained  prominence  if  you  had  re- 
mained in  the  race. 

I  trust  I  am  mistaken.  For  the  sake  of  the  Stg,te 
and  its  insane  I  am  satisfied  that  no  better  appointment 
could  have  been  made  and  your  career  will  be  a  suc- 
cessful one.  Still  I  must  repeat  that  I  fear  that  it  will 
be  lost  time. 

Clevenger  came  to  Kankakee  under  more  fa- 
vorable auspices  than  he  had  come  to  Dunning: 
instead  of  a  recent  college  graduate,  he  was  an 
experienced  professional  man;  instead  of  being 
only  the  pathologist,  he  was  the  chief  physician; 
instead  of  a  brutal  warden  to  thwart  him,  he  had 
an  intelligent  governor  to  aid  him;  instead  of  an 
asylum  buried  in  corruption,  he  was  in  an  insti- 
tution of  honorable  reputation.  His  fervent 
hope  was  that  the  Board  of  Trustees  was  com- 
posed of  men  who  bore  no  resemblance  to  the 
County  Commissioners;  the  board  consisted  of 
President  Edmund  Sill,  agent  for  the  Illinois 
Central  Railroad,  at  Clinton;  J.  W.  Orr,  a 
banker  at  Tuscola,  who  must  have  been  educated 


The  Kankakee  Affair 


111 


in  the  eighteenth  century,  lor  wlicn  he  wrote  a 
letter  he  capitalized  all  his  words;  the  local  mem- 
bers were  the  secretary-treasurer,  D.  C.  Taylor, 
and  F.  D.  Radeke,  aptly  described  by  the  Chi- 


MEDICAL   STAFF    AT    KANKAKEE 

during  clbvenqer's  superintendency 


cago  Record  as  'a  brewer  of  Kankakee  and  a  pil- 
lar of  the  Lutheran  church.' 

Dr  Clevenger  was  glad  to  find  Dr  Delia  E. 
Howe  at  Kankakee;  another  interesting  woman 
on  the  medical  staff  was  Dr  Effie  L.  Lobdell. 
Once  a  lunatic  was  choking  to  death,  and  the 


112       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

male  doctors  began  running  around  looking  for 
their  instruments,  but  Effie  thrust  her  hand  into 
the  patient's  throat  and  pulled  out  a  piece  of 
glass  two  inches  square. 

Clevengee  had  not  been  long  at  Kankakee 
when  a  young  man,  with  whom  he  had  a  slight 
acquaintance,  came  to  the  institution  in  consid- 
erable distress,  and  related  that  he  had  written 
to  the  board  of  trustees  applying  for  the  posi- 
tion of  pathologist,  informing  them  that  he  had 
worked  under  the  direction  of  the  ablest  men  in 
Europe,  and  had  references  from  H.  H.  Don- 
aldson of  the  University  of  Chicago,  E.  C. 
Spitzka  of  New  York,  Forel  of  Zurich,  and 
Dejerine  of  Paris,  yet  no  attention  was  paid  to 
his  application.  Suddenly  he  asked  Clevenger 
what  he  was  doing  at  Kankakee,  and  much  as- 
tonished and  delighted  was  he  to  learn  that  Clev- 
enger was  the  new  superintendent,  for  Cleven- 
ger gave  him  the  pathologist's  place,  thus  put- 
ting him  on  the  first  round  of  the  ladder  of  suc- 
cess, for  that  young  man  was  Adolf  Meyer  of 
Zurich,  the  present  Professor  of  Psychiatry  at 
the  Johns  Hopkins  University. 

One  of  Clevenger's  early  acts  was  to  inspect 
the  general  conditions  of  the  inmates,  and  the 
first  examination  proved  that  the  insane  are  not 


The  Kankakee  Affair  113 

immune  from  the  ailments  of  normal  mortals: 
fifty  patients  were  found  suffering  from  eye 
troubles,  twenty-five  had  diseases  of  the  ear,  ten 
needed  treatment  for  hernias  and  painful  rup- 
tures, two  hundred  and  fifty  women  were  afflicted 
with  some  uterine  derangement,  and  almost 
everyone  had  decayed  teeth. 

The  regular  staff  could  not  cope  with  this  mass 
of  pathology,  but  Clevenger  secured  the  serv- 
ices of  several  Chicago  specialists — dentists, 
ophthalmologists,  otologists,  gynecologists.  As 
they  gave  their  skill  gratuitously,  Clevenger 
could  not  expect  them  to  pay  their  own  fare  to 
and  from  Kankakee,  so  he  invited  the  Illinois 
Central  Railroad  Company  to  participate  in  the 
charity,  and  the  road  immediately  furnished  free 
transportation  to  these  visiting  doctors. 

There  was  no  reason  why  the  trustees  should 
oppose  this  innovation  except  that  it  w^as  an  in- 
novation— but  this  is  usually  a  sufficient  reason 
for  trustees,  and  the  voluntary  specialists  were 
soon  excluded  from  Kankakee. 

Clevenger  had  intended  to  make  Kankakee  a 
civil  service  institution,  but  on  the  seventh  of 
March,  only  four  daj^s  after  the  chairman  of  the 
committee  of  elections  informed  him  of  the  prof- 
fered superintendentship,  he  received  from  Free 


114       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

P.  Morris  a  note  to  the  effect  that  he  should  ap- 
point Robert  O.  Pennewill  business  manager 
of  the  hospital.  Two  months  later  he  told  Clev- 
ENGER  to  appoint  Charles  Harwood  store- 
keeper. But  who  was  Free  P.  Morris  that  he 
issued  orders  to  Dr  Clevenger  with  such  an  air 
of  assurance?  In  the  first  place,  he  was  a  rascal, 
but  in  the  second  place  he  was  the  Iroquois  mem- 
ber of  the  Illinois  legislature,  and  chairman  of  the 
committee  on  judiciary  of  the  house  of  repre- 
sentatives. Then  Trustee  Sill  instructed  Clev- 
enger to  appoint  Hubert  Reynolds  farmer  at 
the  asylum  farm.  Then  Trustee  Orr  sent  word 
to  Clevenger  to  appoint  Miss  Jennie  Brinton 
stenographer.  Then  Trustee  Radeke  forward- 
ed his  nephew  E.  Radeke  to  Clevenger,  with 
a  note  of  introduction  stating,  'Any  ting  you  can 
do  that  may  lead  to  his  fourture  wilfare  will  be 
apriviated  by  me.'  From  this  note,  which  was 
one  of  his  most  careful  literary  eiForts,  as  it  was 
written  in  ink  instead  of  with  his  usual  pencil,  it 
will  be  seen  that  F.  D.  Radeke  spelled  like  Josh 
Billings — but  Josh  was  only  fooling.  Radeke 
could  afford  to  scoff  at  book  education ;  he  manu- 
factured lager  and  Vienna  bottled  beer,  and  like 
the  brewers  whom  Samuel  Johnson  immortal- 
ized, he  was  'rich  beyond  the  dreams  of  avarice.' 


The  Kankakee  Affair  115 

Oh,  merit  is  a  fine  thing,  and  civil  service  rules 
have  no  equal,  but  the  way  to  enter  the  Illinois 
Eastern  Hospital  for  the  Insane  was  to  cultivate 
the  acquaintance  of  Free  P.  Morris  and  the 
Board  of  Trustees. 

Too  many  people  came  to  the  Kankakee  insti- 
tution who  had  no  legitimate  business  there — 
crowds  of  idlers,  troops  of  excursionists,  giggling 
and  babbling  visitors  curious  for  a  new  sensa- 
tion, and  some  suspicious-looking  characters  who 
conversed  in  low  tones  with  the  employes  or  even 
with  the  Board  of  Trustees.  No  self-respecting 
hospital  for  diseases  of  the  flesh  would  tolerate 
such  disturbances — why  then  should  a  hospital 
for  diseases  of  the  mind  permit  this  nuisance? 

On  the  twenty-first  of  May,  Clevenger  de- 
cided to  introduce  a  new  rule:  all  who  entered 
the  grounds  had  to  sign  their  name;  not  that  he 
was  particularly  anxious  for  their  autographs, 
but  it  would  give  him  an  idea  of  the  number  of 
visitors,  and  might  serve  to  keep  some  away.  Lit- 
tle did  Clevenger  anticipate  the  rage  which  this 
regulation  fomented;  the  employes  were  ready 
to  mutiny,  the  strangers  cursed  'the  autocrat,' 
the  Board  of  Trustees  spoke  of  dismissing  him, 
and  the  Kankakee  Times  bespattered  him  with 


116       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

editorial  dirt.     Some  of  the  local  wits  sang  this 
quatrain : 

Is  my  name  written  there 
On  its  pages  bright  and  fair; 
On  the  register  of  the  Hospital, 
Is  my  name  written  there? 

Within  a  week  the  registry-book  was  thrown 
into  the  waste-heap,  with  many  blank  pages  des- 
tined never  to  know  a  human  name. 

There  was  one  day  that  especially  annoyed 
Clevenger — the  Sabbath;  every  summer  Sun- 
day the  street-cars  could  be  seen  filled  with  pas- 
sengers bound  for  Radeke's  beer  and  then  the 
hospital.  Finally  Dr  Clevenger  issued  a  cir- 
cular To  Visitors,  explaining  that  the  grounds 
were  overrun  with  pleasure-seekers  who  intended 
no  mischief,  but  whose  thoughtlessness  had  pre- 
cisely the  same  effect  as  if  they  were  purposely 
malicious.  He  pointed  out  that  near  the  wing 
wards  are  paths  meant  as  short  cuts  for  em- 
ployes, and  in  defiance  of  notices  posted  at  the 
entrances  to  these  walks,  visitors  often  saunter 
along,  close  to  the  open  windows  and  converse 
with  patients,  sometimes  gibing  them  and  other- 
wise behaving  improperly.  Throngs  of  sight- 
seers, whose  ideas  of  mental  diseases  are   ex- 


The  Kankakee  Affair  117 

tracted  mainly  from  sensational  novels,  and  are 
prompted  by  a  very  discreditable  curiosity,  troop 
thru  the  central  building  and  expect  to  be  ad- 
mitted to  the  wards,  in  many  cases  stating  that 
they  wish  to  be  shocked  by  the  horrible  sights  and 
plainly  requesting  to  be  shown  the  worst  cases. 

Citizens  should  remember,  he  exhorted,  that 
this  is  nearly  the  twentieth  century,  and  that 
while  the  care  of  the  insane  has  advanced  to  an 
extent  that  the  mentally  afflicted  are  treated  as 
sick  human  beings,  such  behavior  on  the  part  of 
visitors  befits  better  the  tenth  century  when  these 
unfortunates  were  publicly  and  legally  flogged, 
and  the  populace  gathered  to  deride  those  sup- 
posed to  be  possessed  by  devils.  The  institution 
on  the  banks  of  the  Kankakee  River  is  a  hospital 
for  the  sick  in  mind,  and  not  a  menagerie.  He 
pointed  out  that  many  of  the  patients  there  are 
in  the  first,  and  therefore  most  curable  stage  of 
their  disorder.  Then  he  asked  the  visitors  to 
imagine  how  they  would  resent  some  loved  one 
of  their  own  being  on  exhibition  before  a  mis- 
cellaneous mob,  and  their  chances  of  recovery  in- 
terfered with  thru  such  idle  curiosity.  Thus  he 
went  on  explaining,  and  concluded  by  saying  that 
it  becomes  necessar}"  to  adopt  the  following  rules : 
relatives  and  friends  of  patients  are  always  wel- 


118       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

come,  and  physicians  and  medico-legal  students 
will  be  admitted  readily,  but  hereafter  the  gates 
on  Sunday  will  be  closed  to  mere  pleasure-hunt- 
ers. This  four-page  leaflet  exhibits  such  sympa- 
thy for  the  insane,  and  breathes  such  a  determina- 
tion to  save  them  from  insult  and  injury,  that  it 
reads  like  a  chapter  from  the  heart  of  Pinel. 

But  again  Clevenger  learnt  what  it  means  to 
antagonize  men,  and  conspicuous  among  his  op- 
ponents was  the  brewer  Radeke — if  there  were 
no  Sunday  crowds,  who  would  buy  his  beer?  At 
the  state  institution,  as  at  the  county  asylum,  the 
saloon-keeper  loomed  large.  The  ten  years  faded 
away  in  a  mist.  The  Kankakee  River  ran  dry, 
and  Clevenger  was  again  on  the  sandy  plains  of 
Dunning.  The  features  of  Free  P.  M0RRI& 
seemed  to  turn  into  the  face  of  Mike  McDon- 
ald, and  the  brewer  Radeke  looked  like  the  bru- 
tal Varnell. 

The  opposition  of  boodlers  only  served  to  whet 
Clevenger's  fighting  soul.  The  more  he 
prowled,  the  more  he  saw,  and  what  he  saw  was 
not  good.  Bitterness  increased  on  both  sides. 
We  might  give  a  list  of  details,  but  it  would  be 
repetition — Dunning  all  over  again.  Perhaps 
Clevenger  was  not  as  strong  as  he  had  been; 
perhaps  it  is  not  hygienic  to  add  night-work  tOi 


The  Kankakee  Affair  119 

the  labor  of  the  day,  for  within  a  sliort  time  the 
superintendent  overstepped  the  boundaries  of 
health ;  he  did  not  seek  an  invalid's  bed,  but  it  was 
a  wrecked  Clevengkr  that  walked  thru  the  hos- 
pital, denouncing  political  graft.  On  the  third 
of  June,  at  4.15  p.  m.,  Clevenger  was  handed 
this  note: 

Owing  to  the  overwork  of  Dr  Clevenger,  Superin- 
tendent of  the  Hospital,  it  is  considered  advisable  by 
the  Board  of  Trustees  to  give  him  a  vacation,  for 
recuperation,  during  which  time  the  Board  assumes 
absolute  control  of  this  institution ; 

Therefore,  be  it  resolved,  that  Dr  S.  V.  Clevenger 
is  hereby  granted  a  vacation  of  two  weeks,  during  which 
time  he  is  to  be  relieved  from  all  duties  pertaining  to 
this  institution,  the  said  vacation  to  commence  on  June 
3rd,  1893. 

Clevenger  went  to  his  son's  ranch  at  Raw 
Hide  Buttes,  Wyoming:  superintendent  for 
three  months  and  nervous  prostration,  then  a  cat- 
tle-farm far  from  sin  and  society.  During  those 
two  weeks  Raw  Hide  Buttes  saw  more  mail  than 
ever  before;  Clevenger  conducted  an  enormous 
correspondence  for  a  man  suffering  from  general 
exhaustion.  He  was  kept  informed  about  the 
hospital  by  a  member  of  the  medical  staff.  Chap- 


120       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

MAN  V.  Dean,  who  proved  a  loyal  and  affection- 
ate friend  to  Clevenger;  Dr  Dean  was  a  col- 
lege chum  of  William  F.  Dose,  Altgeld's  sec- 
retary, and  they  were  still  on  the  most  cordial 
terms.  One  of  Dean's  letters  to  Clevenger 
is  worth  preserving  because  of  its  pen-picture  of 
the  redoubtable  Radeke  : 

Summer  has  settled  down  upon  us  since  you  left; 
Albert  and  I  went  up  the  river  the  day  before  yes- 
terday in  a  row-boat,  and  took  our  first  swim  in  the 
Kankakee,  Mr  Sill  left  here  about  a  week  ago,  and  I 
haven't  seen  a  single  specimen  of  the  'genus  trustee' 
since  then  in  this  vicinity.  Things  are  running  along 
very  smoothly  (that  is — fairly  so)  under  the  direction 
of  Dr  'Pegger,'  who  would  make  a  very  able  driver  for 
our  band-wagon  indeed  had  he  but  a  little  more  con- 
fidence in  himself — could  he  but  muster  up  a  little  more 
moral  courage  and  faith  in  his  own  ability,  and  exuvi- 
ate that  thick  skin  of  Deweyism  which  seems  to  stick 
to  him  Hke  a  blanket  to  an  Indian  in  winter-time.  Dr 
Effie  Lobdell  and  I  sit  just  at  the  driver's  elbow, 
however;  take  good  care  that  he  keeps  the  middle  of 
the  road,  and  you  may  depend  we  see  to  it  that  what- 
ever happens  on  our  journey,  schedule  time  is  main- 
tained. 

I  have  kept  Dose  fully  informed  of  the  situation 
here.  We  spent  last  Sunday  at  the  World's  Fair  to- 
gether, and  I  went  into  detail  on  a  great  many  points, 


The  Kankakee  Affair  121 

and  I  was  informed  that  tlicy  are  only  waiting  at 
Springfield  for  the  brewer  to  show  his  hand — to  make 
some  overt  move — that  shall  give  the  governor  sufficient 
cause  and  just  reason  to  remove  him. 

The  governor  'has  it  in'  for  Radeke  for  wiring  him 
at  Champaign  (after  his  speech  to  the  college  boys, 
which  I  enclose)  to  'come  up  here  immediately,'  as 
his  'presence  was  needed ;'  in  fact  the  governor  told 
Radeke  in  my  presence  at  the  supper-table  that  he  had 
put  him  to  great  inconvenience,  and  had  he  known  how 
things  were  he  should  never  have  come  up  here  out 
of  his  way — there  was  no  necessity  for  his  visit  what- 
ever, etc.,  and  poor  Radeke  hung  his  head  like  a 
whipped  spaniel — nearly  swallowed  his  knife — much  to 
the  disgust  of  his  vis  a  ids,  who  chanced  to  be  Mrs 
Altgeld.  Dr  Lobdell  told  me  later  on :  'I  placed 
him  in  the  light  opposite  her,  so  she  could  see  just  what 
kind  of  a  swine  he  really  was.'  For  prudent  fore- 
thought, commend  me  to  the  women  folks. 

It  is  nearly  dinner-time  now,  and  I  must  close.  I 
hope  you  will  enjoy  your  vacation  and  come  back  to 
us  prepared  to  'turn  the  hose  on.' 

At  the  expiration  of  the  two  weeks,  Cleven- 
GER  was  ready  to  return  to  duty,  but  his  vaca- 
tion was  again  extended — this  time  without  pay. 
The  fact  was  this:  the  trustees  discharged  him. 
Governor  Altgeld  now  realized  that  Cleven- 
GER  could  not  work  in  harmony  with  politicians. 


122       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

and  giving  him  $1,000  above  his  salary,  he  let  him 
go.  It  was  an  awful  fizzle — ousted  after  three 
months,  and  nothing  accomplished.  Now  he  had 
to  return  to  Chicago,  and  try  to  regain  his  for- 
mer practice.  So  friend  Gieaed  was  not  only  a 
major  and  a  surgeon — but  also  a  prophet. 

Not  long  afterwards,  half  of  the  trustees  were 
expelled,  and  the  other  half  resigned;  the  next 
superintendent  was  somewhat  vague  about  what 
he  did  with  the  small  sum  of  thirty  thousand  dol- 
lars; and  a  female  inmate — Kitty  Ward — gave 
birth  to  the  inevitable  illegitimate  baby.  These 
incidents  brought  the  Kankakee  asylum  a  little 
official  attention  and  considerable  newspaper 
fame,  and  perhaps  it  was  with  a  grim  'I-told-you- 
so,'  that  Clevenger  pasted  the  clippings  into  his 
scrap-book. 


DREAMING  AND  DRIFTING 

FOR  several  years  Clevenger  was  neurolo- 
gist to  a  Catholic  and  to  a  Hebrew  insti- 
tution— the  Alexian  Brothers  Hospital  and  the 
Michael  Reese  Hospital.  These  were  small 
structures  when  they  were  destroyed  by  Chi- 
cago's great  fire,  but  they  were  rebuilt  in  impos- 
ing style.  There  is  a  picture  of  Clevenger 
taken  in  one  of  the  medical  wards  on  Belden 
Avenue,  showing  the  freethinking  doctor  in  the 
midst  of  Ambrosius  and  Arcadius  and  Aloy- 
sixjs — disease  is  non-sectarian,  and  tic  douloureux 
is  as  painful  in  a  follower  of  Loyola  as  in  an 
admirer  of  Voltaire.  Both  hospitals  treated 
the  sick  of  all  denominations,  but  the  Alexian 
Brothers  limited  their  services  to  males,  and  even 
the  nurses  were  males,  so  Dr  Byford  never  hur- 
ried there  with  ergot  and  forceps. 

Clevenger's  experiences  in  hospitals  for  sick 
bodies  were  not  as  unfortunate  as  his  adventures 
in  asylums  for  sick  minds,  but  man  is  a  natural 

123 


124       The  Don  Quirote  of  Psychiatry 

politician,  and  the  best  institutions  may  be 
tainted  by  intriguery — it  is  said  that  even  the 
Catholic  Church  is  not  wholly  free  from  it.  At 
an  age  when  most  men  cling  tenaciously  to  posi- 
tions, the  quixotic  Clevenger  became  an  exile 
from  hospitals.  He  ceased  to  be  'physician  for 
nervous  and  mental  diseases  to  Michael  Reese 
and  Alexian  Brothers  Hospitals,'  and  held  no 
further  hospital  appointments :  as  a  hospital  offi- 
cial, Dr  Cletenger  was  not  what  is  called  a  suc- 
cess. However,  he  came  out  alive,  which  is  more 
than  can  be  said  of  certain  other  Chicago  doctors 
who  crossed  the  path  of  politicians — ask  the 
ashes  of  Theodore  B.  Sachs! 

On  various  occasions  Clevenger  was  a  teacher. 
In  1883  he  lectured  on  art  anatomy  at  the  Chi- 
cago Art  Institute;  in  1887  he  lectured  on 
physics  at  the  Chicago  College  of  Pharmacy;  in 
1899  he  lectured  on  medical  jurisprudence  at  the 
Chicago  College  of  Law.  His  connexion  with 
these  institutions  was  transient,  as  was  also  his 
lectureship  on  electro-diagnosis  at  the  Electro- 
Medical  School  of  Chicago:  the  faculty  was  nat- 
urally expected  to  boost  medical  electricity,  but 
as  Clevenger  was  more  satirical  than  eulogis- 
tic, he  was  soon  thrown  out. 

In  1900  he  was  appointed  professor  of  neurol- 


Dreaming  and  Driftiny  125 

ogy  and  psychiatry  at  the  Ilarvcy  Medical  Col- 
lege, *a  night-school  for  day-workers.'  It  is  evi- 
dent the  management  forgave  him  the  trick  he 
had  played  a  few  years  previous  when  he  was  in- 
vited to  speak  at  the  inauguration  exercises,  and 
took  advantage  of  the  occasion  to  deliver  a  broad- 
side against  the  political  control  of  asylums. 
Perhaps  the  head  of  the  institution  was  secretly 
pleased,  for  she  was  Dr  Frances  Dickinson,  a 
relative  of  Susan  B.  Anthony,  and  she  pos- 
sessed some  of  that  indomitable  fighter's  spirit. 
Besides  being  president,  Dr  Dickinson  was  also 
professor  of  ophthalmology.  The  vice-president 
was  Dr  Effie  Lobdell,  whom  we  had  the  pleas- 
ure of  meeting  at  Kankakee.  Dr  Lobdell  was 
quite  a  personage  by  this  time,  being  professor 
of  clinical  obstetrics  and  gynecology  at  Harvey 
Medical  College,  chief  physician  and  surgeon  of 
the  Playfair  School  for  Obstetrical  Nurses,  and 
obstetrician  to  the  Cook  County  Hospital  and 
to  the  JNIary  Thompson  Hospital. 

Whatever  may  be  said  of  the  attempt  to  teach 
modern  medicine  by  electric-light,  Frances 
Dickinson  must  be  given  credit  for  two  things: 
she  published  one  of  the  neatest  and  most  cir- 
cumspect of  college  catalogs,  and  she  gathered 
around  her  an  excellent  faculty.     While  Clev- 


126       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ENGER  was  on  the  staif,  the  bland  Harris  E. 
Santee  tried  to  smile  anatomy  into  the  students, 
William  D.  Zoethout  impressed  the  facts  of 
physiology  upon  them  with  Teutonic  thoroness, 
Bernard  Fantus  explained  the  mysteries  of  the 
materia  medica,  W.  O.  Krohn  lectured  on  psy- 
chology, and  the  unique  Byron  Robinson  taught 
gynecological  and  abdominal  surgery. 

Altogether  there  were  fifty  members  upon  the 
faculty,  and  altho  we  believe  all  were  useful,  we 
are  somewhat  startled  to  find  that  Albert 
Schneider  was  listed  as  Professor  of  Physiolog- 
ical and  Psychological  Physiognomy.  From  the 
standpoint  of  alliteration  this  position  is  perfect, 
tho  Professor  Schneider  has  since  left  this  field 
for  the  more  practical  pastures  of  pharmacy. 
Professor  Clevenger  lectured  to  the  seniors,  but 
he  formed  no  lasting  friendships  with  his  pu- 
pils, and  when  the  Harvey  Medical  College 
passed  out  in  the  night,  his  personal  fortunes 
were  unaffected. 

Several  years  later,  Clevenger  became  con- 
nected with  another  night-school — the  Chicago 
Hospital  College  of  Medicine.  This  institution 
is  almost  a  necropolis,  for  it  specializes  in  old 
men  who  once  amounted  to  something.  The  ca- 
reer of  Samuel  Anderson  McWilliams  ex- 


Dreaming  and  Drifting  127 

plains  our  ghoulful  meaning.  In  his  prime,  Mc- 
WiLLiAMS  taught  in  a  Class  A  school — the  Col- 
lege of  Physicians  and  Surgeons  of  Chicago,  and 
his  name,  as  one  of  the  founders,  may  still  be 
read  on  the  corner-stone  of  the  building.  But 
when  his  beard  was  whitened  and  his  mind  a 
trifle  dimmed,  he  became  professor  in  a  Class  B 
school — the  Bennett  Medical  College;  again  the 
years  made  inroads  upon  old  McWilliams,  and 
when  he  was  no  longer  acceptable  at  Bennett  he 
was  received  at  a  Class  C  school — the  Chicago 
Hospital  College  of  Medicine.  Here  he  re- 
mained until  his  death ;  his  career  was  a  descent ; 
he  could  look  backward  and  see  that  his  pupils 
were  occupying  positions  from  which  they  had 
crowded  him  out — but  the  aged  teacher  had  his 
wish:  he  died  a  professor — thanks  to  the  Chi- 
cago Hospital  College  of  Medicine.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  mercurial  Clevenger  soon  sev- 
ered his  connexion  with  this  college,  altho  for  a 
few  weeks  he  had  held  the  exalted  position  of 
registrar. 

But  was  Cle^^nger  ever  connected  with  a 
'good  school'?  Almost.  His  Philadelphia 
friends  wished  him  to  accept  the  newly-estab- 
lished chair  of  biology  at  the  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania, but  the  professor's  salary  of  $500  a  year 


128       The  Don  Quitvote  of  Psychiatry 

was  stationary,  while  Clevenger's  family  was 
growing,  so  he  let  the  honor  go.  Then  there  was 
talk  of  Clevenger  succeeding  William  Fran- 
cis Waugh  at  the  Medico- Chirurgical  College, 
but  altho  Professor  Waugh  eventually  became 
a  Chicagoan,  Clevenger  never  became  a  Phila- 
delphian.  At  different  times,  Reeves  Jackson 
and  William  E.  Quine  invited  Clevenger  to 
deliver  courses  of  lectures  at  the  College  of 
Physicians  and  Surgeons,  but  as  there  was  no 
mention  of  compensation,  he  did  not  accept. 
Every  man  has  his  own  code  of  ethics:  Cleven- 
ger would  gladly  have  written  an  encyclopedia 
gratis,  but  it  was  against  his  principles  to  lecture 
except  for  cash.  At  one  time  he  made  plans  to 
found  a  Biological  School  in  Chicago,  but  was 
led  to  believe  that  he  would  be  offered  the  chair 
of  comparative  anatomy  and  physiology  at  the 
University  of  Chicago.  While  waiting  for  the 
official  announcement,  Clevenger  filled  in  the 
interval  by  delivering  a  Darwinistic  lecture  which 
so  offended  the  Baptist  authorities  of  the  insti- 
tution that  the  old  University  of  Chicago  contin- 
ued its  course  without  him.  We  may  sum  up 
the  career  of  Clevenger  as  a  pedagog  by  saying 
that  it  was  not  prosperous. 

In  Clevenger's  scrap-books  are  various  clip-^ 


a  </L^/./^  ^frv-^  n)^^^  Cl^>^  - 


/^ 


IJITTEE   FHOM    HORATIO   C.    WOOD 


129 


130       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

pings  about  the  hardships  that  inventors  have  en- 
dured, and  in  some  of  his  pubHshed  books  he  re- 
lates instances  of  inventors  who  have  been  robbed 
of  the  fruits  of  their  labors  by  shrewd  and  dis- 
honest financiers.  This  strain  of  talk  indicates 
that  Clevenger  did  not  make  a  fortune  from 
his  inventions. 

Yet  he  had  the  inventor's  knack.  Ever  since 
boyhood  he  was  inventing  something.  A  self- 
reeling  hose  cart,  a  rotary  brush  boot-blacking 
machine,  a  self-equating  sun  dial  to  give  clock- 
time  by  inspection,  a  fac-simile  telegraph,  a 
method  of  measuring  the  pelvic  capacity  by 
means  of  two  rubber  bands  and  a  foot  of  tape, 
a  rubber  strap  for  locating  the  fissure  of  Ro- 
lando,— these  are  some  of  his  devices  which  are 
not  on  the  market. 

Perhaps  his  most  practical  invention  was  a 
model  of  the  brain,  useful  for  demonstration  pur- 
poses. Clevenger  himself  thinks  so  little  of  it 
that  he  refers  to  it  nowhere,  and  has  not  even 
saved  a  sample,  but  we  find  that  some  of  the 
leading  neurologists  of  the  time  were  anxious  to 
secure  copies.  Horatio  C.  Wood  is  known 
mainly  for  his  work  in  therapeutics,  but  in  thei 
eighties  he  produced  a  book  on  nervous  diseases 


Dreaming  and  Drifting  181 

and  taught  neurology  at  the  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania. He  wrote  to  Clevenger:  'Have  you 
a  cast  of  the  convolutions  of  the  human  brain 
for  sale?  If  so,  please  state  price.'  Charles 
L.  Dana,  the  neurologist  of  Cornell  University, 
wrote:  'Will  you  kindly  inform  me  whether  I 
can  now  get  one  or  two  of  the  models  of  the  brain 
devised  by  you?'  William  J.  Morton's  note 
has  an  added  interest  on  account  of  its  reference 
to  the  distinguished  Hammond: 

Would  you  kindly  send  me  wliatever  casts  of  the 
brain  you  have  that  you  are  willing  to  dispose  of.  I 
hope  I  am  right  in  my  recollection  that  Dr  Hammond 
said  you  had  made  certain  casts  and  that  they  could  be 
bought.  I  should  have  said  above,  whatever  separate 
casts,  for  I  would  like  to  see  the  simple  copies  first. 
But  of  the  hemispheres  (I  have  seen  Dr  Hammond's) 
I  would  like  at  least  half  a  dozen  for  lecturing  purposes 
in  the  new  Post  Graduate  School. 

I  hope  I  may  have  the  pleasure  of  receiving  a  paper, 
short  or  long,  for  the  Journal  in  some  of  the  suc- 
ceeding numbers  for  1883.  You  know  how  welcome 
to  our  pages  a  contribution  from  your  pen  will  always 
be. 

Clevenger  did  not  answer  by  return  mail,  for 
in  his  next  communication  Dr  JMorton  says: 


132       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

I  have  just  finished  my  course  of  lectures  on  the 
anatomy  of  the  brain  and  will  not  now  need  the  casts, 
but  I  am  just  as  much  obliged  for  your  kind  informa- 
tion about  them,  and  fear  at  the  same  time  that  you 
underrate  their  value. 

We  miss  your  medical  pen,  and  trust  it  will  be  soon 
back  at  its  old  work — some  good  and  trenchant  speci- 
mens of  which  the  Journal  well  knows. 

The  Journal  to  which  Dr  Morton  alludes  is 
the  Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental  Disease ,  for 
he  was  now  editor  of  Jewell's  transplanted 
quarterly.  Unhappy  Morton!  His  ancestors 
attended  Harvard  University  when  there  were 
only  five  members  in  a  class,  and  they  fought  in 
the  revolution  from  the  battle  of  Bunker  Hill  un- 
til tyranny  was  overthrown;  he  was  born  in  the 
glorious  year  in  which  his  father  gave  surgical 
anesthesia  to  the  world,  and  he  won  an  honor- 
able name  for  himself  in  neurology  and  electro- 
therapy, as  practitioner  and  professor,  investiga- 
tor and  editor,  but  in  later  days  he  and  Julian 
Hawthorne  got  mixed  up  in  King  Solomon's 
mines,  and  the  gates  of  a  federal  penitentiary 
closed  upon  these  talented  sons  of  immortal, 
fathers.  Julian  Hawthorne,  being  an  author, 
eased  his  grief  in  a  book,  but  the  harrowing 
experience  broke  the  physician's  heart. 


Dreaming  and  Drifting  188 

The  big  invention  of  Clkvenger's  life  was  the 
Clevenger  Book  and  Kleetric  Typewriter.  After 
looking  upon  the  basket  full  of  long  grasshopper 
legs,  the  typebar  levers,  ratchets,  pinions,  wheels, 
cams,  racks,  cogs,  springs,  rods,  all  so  clumsy 
and  complicated,  he  decided  that  the  typewriter 
required  simplification.  He  studied  the  whole 
history  of  typewriters,  from  the  first  crude  ma- 

Clevenger  Book  Typewriter 

For  Books,  Cards,  Envelopes,  Letters,  Documents  of  all  kinds — ANY  SIZE. 


^^^^?^^vj|,,. 


'^^^^k-^^^"' 

^''*^i>**' 


Wrilci  on  flnt  •urfece.      Doe,  more,  and  h-  Her  -'ork  thun   olhrr  mitchinss. 

BOOK  AND  ELECTRIC  TYPEWRITER   CO.,  Park  Ridge,  III. 

S.  V.  ClEVCNnER,  Stc'y  pnd  Twjj. 

chine  of  Queen  Anne's  time  down  to  the  majes- 
tic Remington,  he  waded  thru  all  the  patent  office 
records  in  Washington — but  nowhere  did  he  find 
principles  which  satisfied  him.  At  this  period  he 
expected  to  start  a  great  sanitarium  in  Dela- 
ware, but  he  forgot  that  a  sanitarium  requires 
undivided  attention.  The  sanitarium  idea  fiz- 
zled out,  but  he  w^ent  on  with  his  typewriter.  An 
inventor    is    never    discouraged — only    a    little 


134        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

longer  and  all  will  be  well.  Why  complain  if 
unreasonable  neighbors  whisper  something  about 
a  crank?  Is  it  not  the  fate  of  all  great  men 
to  be  misunderstood?  Did  not  folks  laugh  at 
Fulton's  Folly — until  they  scrambled  into  his 
steamboat?  Why  lament  if  the  purse  be  empty 
today?  Only  another  screw  to  be  tightened,  only 
another  wheel  to  be  applied — and  tomorrow 
fame  and  fortune  will  smile  brightly. 

The  day  came  when  Clevenger  patented  his 
improved  book  typewriter — a  machine  that  would 
never  get  out  of  alignment,  for  its  working  parts 
were  so  simple  that  they  could  be  covered  by  a 
small  cigar  box.  The  machine  could  be  put  on 
the  market  for  a  few  dollars — hundreds  of  thou- 
sands would  be  sold.  Clevenger  started  a  com- 
pany— shares  of  stock  were  ten  dollars  each. 

He  published  a  statement  to  the  effect  that  he 
now  intended  to  make  a  business  of  every  aspect 
of  this  matter,  and  to  go  into  the  psychology  of 
all  persons  and  things  concerned  therein,  so  that 
the  gentry  who  live  by  stealing  the  work  of  oth- 
ers will  find  they  have  no  chance  to  absorb  this 
typewriter.  Capitalists  willing  to  float  corpora- 
tions would  be  avoided  as  often  unconscionable 
and  liable  to  exploit  stock  improperly — not  a 
drop  of  water  would  get  into  this  stock.    Who- 


Dreaming  and  Drifting  185 

ever  subscribes  and  pays  for  a  sbare  of  stock  in 
this  company  at  the  par  vakie  of  ten  dollars  per 
share  will  have  his  interests  conscientiously 
guarded,  and  would,  so  Ci.evenger  hoped,  realize 
a  fortune  from  the  venture.  Then  came  the  in- 
evitable comparison:  holders  of  ten  dollar  shares 
of  telephone  stock  grew  rich  on  the  single  share. 
In  a  vision  he  saw  his  typewriters  working  all 
over  the  land:  cheap,  easy  to  manipulate,  inde- 
structible. 

Dreams,  dreams,  dreams, — frenzied  faith  of 
an  old  Don  Quixote.  Never  has  a  human  ear 
heard  the  clicking  of  the  Clevenger  typewriter. 
The  company  is  not  doing  business,  and  the  pat- 
ent will  lie  in  the  Patent  Office  in  Washington 
— until  it  expires. 

An  American  does  not  consider  his  education 
complete  until  he  has  failed  as  an  editor — have 
we  not  more  periodicals  than  the  rest  of  the  world 
put  together?  Clea^enger  was  an  editor  on  va- 
rious occasions.  While  still  at  Chattanooga,  Ten- 
nessee, he  was  city  editor  of  the  American  Un- 
ion, but  when  that  paper  adopted  southern  prin- 
ciples, he  founded  The  Unconditional  in  Harri- 
son, Hamilton  County.  As  we  look  over  its  four 
small  pages,  the  first  entirely  devoted  to  adver- 
tisements, the  third  given  up  to  jokes  and  cases 


136       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

in  chancery,  the  fourth  exckisively  occupied  by 
sheriff  sales,  we  Avonder  what  was  the  purpose 
of  such  a  newspaper,  but  perhaps  the  following 
letter  written  to  Clevenger,  in  1866,  by  John 
B.  Brownlow — editor  of  The  Whig  at  Knox- 
ville,  and  son  of  'Fighting  Parson'  Brownlow, 
the  Governor  of  Tennessee — may  help  to  eluci- 
date the  situation: 

Immediately  upon  seeing  The  Unconditional  I  or- 
dered it  to  be  put  on  my  exchange  list.  1  am  very 
glad  you  are  publishing  a  true  paper  in  Hamilton 
County.  The  miserable  hermaphrodite  concern  at 
Chattanooga  deserves  opposition.  1  wish  there  was 
a  loyal  paper  in  every  county  in  East  Tennessee  to 
strengthen  the  loyal  party.  If  governed  alone  by  self- 
ishness I  would  desire  tliis,  for  if  the  loyal  party  of 
the  state  goes  down,  we  all  go  down  together.  Nearly 
all  the  papers  in  the  state  are  rebel,  and  this  is  the  dis- 
advantage we  labor  under.  I  trust  you  will  be  suc- 
cessful. 

In  spite  of  this  wish,  Clevenger  was  not  suc- 
cessful— his  subscribers  were  few  and  most  of  the 
few  were  in  arrears — and  as  a  result  he  went  to 
Montana,  and  later  to  Dakota  Territory  where 
he  became  editor  and  half-owner  of  the  Press  and 
Dakotaian.     Here  too  we  notice  his  penchant  foi'' 


Dreaming  and  Drifting  187 

supplying  jocose  information,  of  which  the  fol- 
lowing is  an  exami)le: 

It  is  estimated  that  over  2,000  toes  were  frozen 
last  winter  in  Minnesota,  because  the  girls  wouldn't  ask 
their  fellows  in,  but  kept  them  standing  at  the  gate. 

It  may  be  mentioned  that  Clevenger  paid 
$6,000  for  his  half-interest  and  sold  it  for  $3,000 
— but  that  wasn't  so  funny. 

Not  only  did  Clevenger  fail  as  an  editor,  but 
his  friends  failed  too.  In  1880  John  Michels 
founded  Science^,  and  edited  it  so  ably  that  it  at 
once  became  one  of  the  leading  scientific  weeklies 
in  the  world.  Clevenger's  name  was  mentioned 
in  the  first  volume  a  few  times,  and  several  of 
his  contributions  appeared  in  the  second  volume. 
Michels  and  Clevenger  were  on  cordial  terms, 
and  Clevenger  expected  to  write  often  for  the 
journal,  but  Michels  was  such  an  admirable  ed- 
itor he  had  no  time  to  devote  to  the  financial  man- 
agement, and  Science  soon  passed  out  of  his 
hands. 

Six  years  after  Science  was  established,  Clev- 
enger had  another  opportunity  to  witness  the 
dangers  that  beset  an  editor.  For  some  time, 
B.  F.  Underwood  and  his  wdfe  Sarah,  author- 
ess of  Heroines  of  FreetJiougJit,  had  conducted 


138       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

The  Index  at  Boston.  A  zinc  merchant,  Ed- 
ward C.  Hegeler, — one  of  those  rich  men  with 
ideas  who  hkes  to  be  surrounded  by  intellectual 
people — desired  to  found  a  liberal  journal  in  the 
West,  and  he  finally  induced  the  Underwoods 
to  abandon  The  Index,  and  come  to  Chicago.  On 
the  seventeenth  of  February,  1887,  The  Open 
Court  made  its  appearance.  It  had  none  of  the 
malice  or  the  militancy  that  limited  D.  M.  Ben- 
nett's Truth  Seeker  to  a  certain  class,  but  num- 
bered among  its  contributors  such  men  and 
women  as  John  Burroughs,  Thomas  David- 
son, Felix  Oswald,  Moncure  D.  Conway, 
M.  M.  Trumbull,  Edmund  Montgomery, 
Frederick  May  Holland,  E.  D.  Cope,  Les- 
ter F.  Ward,  Elizabeth  Cady  Stanton, 
George  Jacob  Holyoake  and  Hypatia  BiiAD- 
laugh  Bonner. 

In  the  fifth  number  of  the  journal  Clevenger 
saw  a  review  of  one  of  his  own  books,  and  after 
reading  the  two  columns  of  intelligent  praise  he 
decided  it  was  the  best  review  he  had  seen,  and 
he  called  upon  the  editor  to  express  his  thanks. 
Mr  Underwood  informed  him  that  the  review 
had  been  written  by  Dr  Edmund  Montgomery, 
who  was  then  living  in  Texas. 

Montgomery  was  a  Scotchman  who  had  been 


Dreaming  and  Drifting  189 

brought  up  in  Frankfurt,  where  he  daily  saw 
Schopenhauer  pass  with  his  poodle.  lie  stud- 
ied under  Helmiioltz,  and  became  acquainted 
with  Feuerbach  and  Moi.eschott,  and  with  the 
pupils  of  ScHELLiNG,  FicHTE  and  Hegel.  He 
attended  various  German  universities,  receiving 
his  M.D.  at  Wurzburg.  Returning  to  England, 
he  had  a  laboratory  at  the  Zoological  Gardens, 
where  he  often  met  and  conversed  with  Darwin. 
Montgomery  had  accomplished  the  remarkable 
feat  of  reading  Kant's  Critique  of  Pure  Reason 
five  times,  and  then  wrote  a  book  himself  in  Ger- 
man to  refute  Kant's  theory  of  knowledge.  His 
volume  in  English,  On  the  Formation  of  So- 
called  Cells  in  Animal  Bodies,  was  mentioned  by 
Sir  Richard  Owen  in  the  Anatomy  of  Verte- 
brates as  'an  important  contribution  to  the 
philosophy  of  physiology.'  He  busied  himself 
with  other  researches  which  appeared  in  German 
and  English  technical  journals,  but  ill-health 
caused  him  to  come  to  Texas. 

When  Montgomery's  essay,  Is  Pantheism  the 
Legitimate  Outcome  of  3Iodern  Science?  was 
read  before  the  Concord  School  of  Philosophy, 
Boston  was  so  astounded  that  such  erudition 
could  come  out  of  Texas,  that  the  following 
lines  appeared  in  the  Boston  Record: 


140       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

A  Texan  floored  the  Concord  crowd, 

Sing  high !  and  sing  ho !  for  the  great  southwest ; 
He  sent  'em  a  paper  to  read  aloud, 

And  'twas  done  up  in  style  by  one  of  their  best. 

The  Texan  he  loaded  his  biggest  gun 

With  all  the  wise  words  he  ever  had  seen, 

And  he  fired  at  long  range  with  death-grim  fun, 
And  slew  all  the  sages  with  his  machine. 

He  muddled  the  muddlers  with  brain-cracking  lore, 
He  went  in  so  deep  that  his  followers  were  drowned. 

But  he  swam  out  himself  to  the  telluric  shore, 

And  crowed  in  his  glee  o'er  the  earthlings  around. 

ENVOY. 

Oh  Plato,  dear  Plato,  come  back  from  the  past! 

And  we'll  forgive  all  that  you  e'er  did  to  vex  us, 
If  you'll  only  arrange  for  a  colony  vast 

And  whisk  these  philosophers  all  ofF  to  Texas. 

After  Montgomery's  review,  Clevenger  him- 
self became  a  frequent  contributor  to  the  Open 
Court,  writing  a  plea  for  Volapuk  and  an  attack 
on  Christian  Science,  and  various  articles  on  psy- 
chiatry and  monism.  He  rejoiced  to  find  a  me- 
dium where  he  could  express  certain  views  that 
he  held — and  he  was  paid  for  it  too. 


Dreaming  and  Drifting  141 

It  was  too  good  to  hist — troul)lc  was  corning. 
Mr  Hegeler  had  a  private  secretary,  a  doctor  of 
philosophy,  Paul  Carus.  Mr  Hegeler  had 
also  a  daughter  named  Mary.  After  Miss 
Mary  Hegeler  became  Mrs  Mary  Carus,  Mr 
Hegeler  insisted  that  Dr  Carus  be  one  of  the 
editors  of  the  Open  Court.  From  the  stand- 
point of  the  Underwoods  the  request  was  un- 
reasonable, since  they  carefully  edited  every  line 
of  the  paper  and  there  was  not  room  for  another 
blue  pencil.  Accordingly,  they  refused  to  move 
up  and  let  Carus  sit  on  the  editorial  chair.  But 
publisher  Hegeler  felt  he  had  certain  ideas  to 
promulgate,  and  of  course  son-in-law  Carus  un- 
derstood these  better  than  the  strange  Under- 
woods, and  as  Hegeler  owned  the  paper,  the 
Underavoods  were  compelled  to  resign.  The 
first  volume  of  the  Open  Court  contained  their 
salutatory  and  their  valedictory.  In  touching 
but  dignified  words  they  bade  farewell  to  their 
readers.  They  could  not  return  to  The  Index, 
as  it  had  been  discontinued  when  they  abandoned 
it ;  Mr  Underwood  was  forced  into  some  uncon- 
genial newspaper  work,  and  soon  lapsed  into  ob- 
scurity. Dr  Carus  immediately  took  charge  of 
the  Open  Court,  and  has  edited  it  with  industry 
and  ability  ever  since.     He  is  well  known  for  his 


142       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

many  philosophical  brochures.  Dr  Clevenger 
WTote  a  little  under  his  regime,  but  he  was  not  a 
favorite  with  the  new  judge  of  the  Open  Court j 
and  soon  ceased  to  contribute. 

There  have  been  editors  who  have  swayed  the 
destinies  of  nations,  but  editorship  was  never 
profitable  to  Clevenger. 


VI 

BOOKS  AND  ESSAYS 

WE  have  now  seen  what  a  restless  and  ver- 
satile man  was  Clevenger:  clerk,  sol- 
dier, hotel  keeper,  probate  judge,  court  commis- 
sioner, revenue  collector,  surveyor,  telegrapher, 
engineer,  pathologist,  alienist,  hospital  superin- 
tendent, teacher,  inventor,  printer  and  editor. 
But  tho  he  tried  his  hand  at  twenty  trades,  yet 
his  credo  could  be  summed  up  in  the  noble  words 
of  Lowell:  'I  am  a  bookman.'  His  heart  was 
in  his  manuscripts. 

He  began  to  write  for  publication  while  in  his 
teens,  his  earliest  efforts  being  miniature  articles 
in  the  'Scientific  American'  for  1859.  Similar 
technical  sketches  appeared  later  in  'Van  Nos- 
trand's  Engineering  Magazine:'  Instruments  of 
Aluminium  was  written  at  a  time  when  this  metal 
was  not  much  employed,  and  Clevenger  thought 
its  light  weight  w^ould  enable  arcs  to  be  made 
larger,  and  this  would  be  an  advantage  in  avoid- 
ing   trigonometrical    errors.      American    Car- 

143 


144!       The  Don  Quia^ote  of  Psychiatry 

tography  urged  uniformity  of  methods  in  vari- 
ous government  map-making  departments.  A 
Rheostat  for  Electric  Battery  appeared  in  the 
'American  Practitioner.'  Optical  Appearances 
of  Comets  was  published  in  the  'Sidereal  Messen- 
ger,' and  contained  his  theory  that  comets  are 
mere  reflections  from  nebular  masses  of  vast  me- 
teoric aggregations.  Astronomy  was  one  of  his 
hobbies,  as  is  evident  from  his  correspondence 
with  the  star-men,  particularly  with  the  cele- 
brated BuENHAM  of  Lick  Observatory. 

Clevenger's  articles  in  'Van  Nostrand's  En- 
gineering Magazine'  appeared  in  1874.  After 
an  author  has  written  a  few  articles,  he  usually 
feels  hke  producing  a  book.  Your  humble  ar- 
ticle is  buried  among  other  men's  writings,  but 
a  book  comes  into  the  world  clothed  in  leather 
or  fine  cloth,  with  golden  letters  stamped  across 
its  back,  and  it  stands  upright  upon  the  shelf. 
In  1874,  when  a  United  States  Deputy  Surveyor, 
Clevenger  wrote  his  first  book,  A  Treatise  on 
Government  Surveying,  published  by  the  Van 
TsTostrand  Company  of  New  York.  It  is  the 
only  one  of  his  works  which  has  gone  thru  sev- 
eral editions,  and  from  which  the  royalties  were 
visible.  We  understand  that  it  is  still  used  by 
students  and  carried  by  engineers  in  the  field — 


Books  and  Essays  145 

perhaps  because  Colonel  I.  N.  IIigbke,  one  of  the 
oldest  and  most  competent  deputy  surveyors  in 
the  Union,  declared  he  knew  several  contracting 
individuals  to  fail  in  their  tasks,  because  they 
did  not  possess  the  knowledge  contained  in  Clev- 
enger's  book. 

The  volume  was  dedicated  to  the  Honorable 
Columbus  Delano,  Secretary  of  the  Interior, 
'in  memory  of  pleasant  conversations;'  in  his  let- 
ter of  acknowledgment,  the  Secretary  wrote, 
'The  fame  of  Clevenger  lives  in  the  enduring 
marbles  his  genius  wrought ;  and  I  trust  that  his 
son  may  achieve  equal  success  as  an  author.' 

We  have  read  this  work  for  the  same  reason 
that  Richard  Le  Gallienne  read  Grant  Al- 
len's Force  and  Energy — because  a  copy  was 
presented  to  us ;  and  we  confess  we  know  as  much 
about  surveying  as  poet  Richard  knows  about 
physics. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  even  in  1874  Clev- 
enger had  begun  his  campaign  against  political 
corruption,  for  in  the  circulars  advertising  his 
book  he  inserted  hints  like  these:  'There  are  sev- 
eral Surveyors-General  who  do  not  sell  contracts 
— but  they  do  not  save  $10,000  a  year  from  a 
salary  of  $2,000.'     'Contractors  are  not  alwiays 


146       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

surveyors.     Why  not  entrust  our  navy  to  poli- 
ticians' ? 

Five  years  later  Clevenger  was  living  in  an- 
other atmosphere:  he  was  an  M.D.,  and  spent  his 
time   at   the   dead-house   of  the   county   insane 
asylum,  and  in  Professor  Jewell's  library — the 
most  extensive  neurological  library  in  the  West. 
The  first  result  of  his  studies  was  an  essay  on 
Cerebral  Topography,  which  was  published  Oc- 
tober, 1879,  in  the  'Journal  of  Nervous  and  Men- 
tal Disease.'     The  recent  graduate  must  have 
been    gratified    to    find    an    article    by    Weir 
Mitchell  in  the  same  issue.   Clevenger's  essay 
contained   the   names,   synonyms,    and  localiza- 
tions of  various  portions  of  the  human  brain, 
based  on  an  examination  of  the  English,  Italian, 
French  and  German  literature,  and  on  original 
studies  of  about  one  hundred  brains  post-mor- 
tem.    It    was    a    splendid    beginning — another 
American    neurologist    was    born.      Burt    G. 
Wilder  read  Clevenger's  contribution,  and  find- 
ing the  description  of  the  sulcus  occipitalis  longi- 
tudinalis  inferior  to  be  original,  he  named  it  Clev- 
enger's   fissure.     Strange    to    say,    Clevenger 
himself  insists  that  Ecker  had  previously  de- 
scribed this  inferior  occipital  fissure,  but  Wilder, 
who  of  course  was  familiar  with  Ecker's  writ- 


Books  and  Essays  147 

ings,  is  our  great  nomenclaturist,  and  so  Clevenr 
ger's  fissure  is  found  in  tlie  medical  dictionaries 
unto  this  day.  Thus  in  the  year  that  he  was 
granted  his  diploma,  the  name  of  Clevenger  be- 
came an  eponym  in  cerebral  anatomy. 

In  the  next  number  of  the  magazine,  January, 
1880,  Clevenger  reviewed  Benedikt's  Brains 
of  Criminals,  disagreeing  with  him  decidedly, 
Clevenger's  contention  being  that  criminals  had 
no  special  brain  shape  we  could  make  out  with 
present  means  any  more  than  they  had  criminal 
peculiarities  of  nose,  eyes,  etc.  Benedikt  out- 
lombrosed  Lombroso  in  his  belief  in  the  'born 
criminal,'  and  as  he  did  not  hesitate  to  announce 
that  he  found  the  cerebellum  in  criminals  uncov- 
ered, it  is  not  odd  that  he  was  attacked  by  ra- 
tional neurologists. 

For  the  following  number,  which  w^as  the 
April  issue,  Clevenger  contributed  an  article  on 
The  Sulcus  of  Rolando  as  an  Index  to  the  Intel- 
ligence of  Animals.  He  took  the  position  that 
this  fissure  w^as  farther  back  in  an  ascending  scale 
of  intelligence,  as  the  increased  size  of  the  fron- 
tal lobe  pushed  it  backward;  also  that  the 
medulla  oblongata  developed  more  rectangularly 
in  bimana,  the  increase  in  size  of  the  frontal  lobe 
pushing  the  entire  brain  backward  to  form  this 


148       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

right  angle  in  proportion  to  the  intelligence  in- 
crease; as  the  basilar  process  accompanies  this 
change,  skulls  can  add  this  index  to  Camper's 
facial  angle. 

In  August  of  this  year  the  American  Associa- 
tion for  the  Advancement  of  Science  held  its 
meeting  at  Boston,  and  Clevenger  journeyed, 
there.  At  this  gathering  he  saw  several  notables 
with  whose  work  he  had  long  been  familiar,  but 
Cle^^nger  did  not  come  merely  for  the  purpose 
of  admiring  others ;  he  had  a  paper  of  his  own  to 
read,  the  Plan  of  the  Cerehro-Spinal  Nervous 
System,  and  in  October  it  was  published  in  Jew- 
ell's journal.  Here  he  suggested  cerebral, 
homologies  such  as  the  cerebellum  being  formed 
from  coalesced  intervertebral  ganglia:  the  Gas- 
serian  ganglion  was  an  intervertebral  originally 
and  other  lobes  in  all  mammals  were  originally 
developed  from  intervertebral  ganglia,  as  arche- 
typal skull  shows  ancestral  vertebral  segment 
plan. 

Besides  the  'Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental 
Disease,'  Cle^'^enger  wrote  for  other  periodicals 
during  1880:  he  conducted  a  Saturday  Science 
Column  in  the  'Chicago  Tribune,'  and  he  as- 
sisted E.  C.  Dudley  in  editing  the  first  issue  of 
the  'Chicago  Medical  Gazette,'  later  called  the 


Books  and  Es.snys  149 

'Chicago  Medical  Review.'  DdDi-KV  wanted  a 
pathologist  and  a  surgeon  on  his  staff,  and  asked 
Clevenger  to  hunt  up  a  couple  of  good  men. 
Clevenger  knew  a  foreigner  who  had  recently 
arrived  in  Chicago  and  had  a  reputation  in 
pathology,  and  he  told  Christian  Fenger  ahout 
the  new  journal,  and  the  talented  Dane  agreed 
to  write  for  it,  tho  he  was  probably  not  excited  at 
the  prospect,  as  he  had  already  contributed  to 
medical  periodicals.  But  at  the  Cook  County 
Hospital,  Ceevenger  found  a  promising  young 
interne,  fresh  from  college,  named  JNIurphy, 
whom  he  persuaded  to  send  surgical  reports  to 
the  'Review,' — and  these  were  Dr  Murphy's  first 
contributions  to  medical  journalism.  But  in  the 
days  when  John  B.  Murphy  became  the  sur- 
gical king  of  Chicago,  Clevenger  despised  him 
for  kneeling  at  an  archbishop's  feet  to  receive  a 
knightship  from  the  church  which  had  perse- 
cuted science  when  science  was  weak. 

With  the  third  number,  Clevenger  became 
editor  of  the  department  of  Medical  Physics,  but 
characteristically  enough,  soon  relinquished  the 
task.  For  the  JNIarch  'Chicago  jNIedical  Review,' 
he  wrote  Guide  to  Post-Mortem  E.vaminations 
of  the  Brain,  and  in  June  contributed  a  brief 
communication  on  Laceration  of  Cervix  Uterij 


150       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

as  a  probable  cause  of  recurring  abortions,  to 
which  Editor  Dudley  appended  this  note: 

The  history  of  the  lesion  as  given  in  the  case-books 
of  the  Woman's  Hospital  in  the  State  of  New  York, 
in  the  private  records  of  Dr  Emmet,  and  in  our  own 
records,  proves  the  correctness  of  the  views  above  ex- 
pressed, altho,  so  far  as  we  are  aware,  these  views 
have  not  hitherto  been  specially  published. 

Clevenger  contributed  nothing  further  to 
gynecology,  but  young  Dudley  soon  became 
professor  of  diseases  of  women  in  Clevenger's 
alma  mater,  and  developed  into  Chicago's  mas- 
ter-gynecologist :  for  years  his  skill  has  corrected 
the  mistakes  of  nature  and  the  blunders  of  lesser 
surgeons. 

The  November  'Chicago  Medical  Journal  and 
Examiner,' — an  important  publication  which  had 
been  founded  in  1844  and  was  now  edited  by| 
Davis,  Hyde  and  Brower, — contained  Cleven- 
ger's Cerebral  Anatomy  Simplified.  Further- 
more, during  the  year  he  had  read  the  first  re- 
sults of  his  research  work  on  the  mercurials,  to 
the  Chicago  Biological  Society  and  to  the  Il- 
linois State  Microscopical  Society.  Altogether, 
1880  was  a  fruitful  year,  and  Clevenger  ac- 
quired 'standing.' 


Books  and  Essays  161 

During  1881  there  were  not  many  days  dur- 
ing which  the  pen  of  Clevenger  was  dry.  He 
wrote  up  his  further  researches  with  mercury, 
contributed  Comparative  Neurology  to  the  Jan- 
uary-February 'American  Naturalist,'  edited  by 
Edward  Drinker  Cope,  and  the  July  issue  con- 
tained his  lecture  on  the  Origin  and  Descent  of 
the  Human  Brain,  showing  the  development  of 
lobes  from  ganglia  formed  on  back  of  spinal  cord. 
This  address  had  been  read  in  February  before 
the  Chicago  Academy  of  Sciences. 

On  March  11,  1881,  he  spoke  on  Nerve  Cells 
and  Their  Function  before  the  Illinois  State 
Microscopical  Society,  and  made  it  the  subject 
of  his  American  Neurological  Association  thesis. 
It  appeared  in  abstract  in  the  'Chicago  Medical 
Review,'  but  to  Clevenger's  chagrin,  was  full  of 
typographical  errors.  However,  such  accidents 
are  liable  to  occur  in  the  best-conducted  printer- 
ies.  No  doubt  the  proofreaders  of  the  Bible  are 
conscientious  men,  and  yet  one  edition  appeared 
in  London  with  the  'not'  omitted  from  the  sev- 
enth commandment.  In  this  paper  he  advanced 
his  histogenetic  nerve-cell  theory,  claiming  that 
the  nerve-fibre  and  not  the  nerve-cell  is  the  first 
to  arise  in  forms  above  the  protozoa,  for  in  noto- 
chordal  animals  an  elaborate  system  of  nerves 


152       Tlie  Don  Quirote  of  Psychiatry 

exists  without  a  nerve-cell  being  present.  He 
took  the  ground  that  histogenesis  was  the  main 
function  of  the  nerve-cell,  the  axis  cylinder  being 
produced  from  the  cell. 

His  paper,  Schmidt  on  Yellow  Fever,  which 
he  read  in  April  before  the  Chicago  Biological 
Society,  appeared  in  the  May  'Chicago  Medical 
Journal  and  Examiner.'  H.  D.  Schmidt  of 
New  Orleans  was  crippled  with  rheumatoid 
arthritis,  but  when  it  settled  in  his  lower  limbs 
and  left  his  hands  free,  he  was  a  master  of  mi- 
nute injections,  and  could  make  sections  and 
drawings  that  won  the  admiration  of  men  like 
NoTT,  Leidy,  Jewell,  Hammond,  Spitzka, 
RoswELL  Park,  Lester  Curtis  and  E.  C.  Se- 
GUiN.  Poor  Schmidt!  he  announced  his  discov- 
ery of  the  biliary  capillaries  as  the  commence- 
ment of  the  hepatic  duct,  in  the  'American  Jour- 
nal of  Medical  Sciences,'  a  generation  before 
Clevenger  thought  of  studying  medicine,  and 
now  Clevenger  was  trying  to  push  his  books,  so 
Schmidt  would  have  a  few  dollars  for  himself 
and  family.  Schmidt's  work  on  the  histol- 
ogy of  the  human  liver,  on  the  origin  and 
development  of  the  colored  blood  corpus- 
cles in  man,  on  the  construction  of  the  double- 
bordered   nerve   fibre,    on   the    development    of 


Books  and  Essays  153 

the  smaller  vessels  in  the  liiirnjin  einhryo,  on 
the  structure  and  function  of  the  ganglionic  hod- 
ies  of  the  cerehro-spinal  axis,  on  the  pathological 
anatomy  of  leprosy,  and  his  microtome  and  in- 
jector, placed  him  in  the  forefront  of  American 
microscopists,  and  much  of  his  work  was  puh- 
lished  in  England  by  the  Royal  Microscopical 
Society  of  London.  His  masterpiece,  however, 
was  his  work  on  the  Pathology  and  Treatment 
of  Yellow  Fever — but  the  sting  of  a  mosquito 
antiquated  the  labors  of  a  life-time. 

More  trouble  was  in  store  for  the  unhappy 
Schmidt:  a  year  after  Clevenger's  eulogy, 
Koch  proclaimed  his  discovery  of  the  tubercle 
bacillus,  but  in  America  'Koch's  bugs'  excited 
more  skepticism  than  enthusiasm — read  George 
F.  Shrady's  editorial  of  unbelief  in  the  'Medical 
Record.'  And  Schmidt,  in  the  'Chicago  Med- 
ical Journal  and  Examiner'  had  the  audacity  to 
state  that  what  Koch  imagined  were  bacilli  were 
only  crystals.  In  this  year  Darwin  passed 
away,  but  his  mantle  of  gentleness  did  not  de- 
scend upon  Koch.  In  scathing  terms  Koch — 
who  had  all  the  truth  on  his  side — answered  his 
American  critics,  and  was  especially  ironical  with 
Schmidt.  The  tone  of  his  reply  is  indicated 
in  these  lines: 


154       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

.  Schmidt  however  is  considered  in  America  to  be  a 
great  microscopist,  and  what  Schmidt  does  not  see  no 
one  else  can  possibly  see.  It  could,  therefore,  be  no 
bacilli  that  the  European  microscopists  saw.  The  point 
then  is  to  discover  what  sort  of  things  they  are.  This, 
too,  the  great  microscopist  Schmidt  very  soon  dis- 
covered.    They  are  fat  crystals,  of  course. 

But  every  scientist  has  his  'cupboard  of  mis- 
takes,'— whether  he  acknowledges  it  or  not.  Ten 
years  later  Koch  himself  published  certain 
statements  which  time  has  not  upheld.  As  for 
Schmidt,  we  can  write  his  epitaph  in  a  few 
words :  applauded  by  scientists  and  neglected  by 
society,  he  acquired  knowledge  instead  of 
money,  and  died  without  being  able  to  pay  his 
own  funeral  expenses.  He  was  a  beggar  with 
an  international  reputation. 

Some  writers  adopt  the  policy  of  praising 
everyone,  and  as  everyone  likes  to  be  praised,  it 
is  a  policy  that  pays.  But  Clevenger  was  more 
of  a  'knocker'  than  a  'booster.'  Toward  the  end 
of  the  year,  in  his  vice-presidential  address  before 
the  Chicago  Electrical  Society,  on  Medical  Elec- 
tricity, which  appeared  in  the  November  'Chi- 
cago Medical  Journal  and  Examiner,'  he  de- 
nounced contemporary  electrotherapy — some- 
what  as   pharmacotherapy  is   arraigned  today. 


Boohs  and  Essays  155 

G.  M.  Beard  and  A.  D.  Rockwell  had  pub- 
lished a  large  book  on  the  subject,  which  Clev- 
ENGETi  singled  out  for  attack,  tho  he  put  all  the 
blame  on  Beard,  whom  he  called  an  'educated 
quack,'  and  accused  of  'voluminous  nonsense,' 
and  of  'show,  pretense,  glitter,  and  ovvlishness,' 
while  he  explained  that  'the  junior  partner  of  the 
firm  became  disgusted  with  the  trickiness  of  the 
senior,  and  dissolved  the  partnership.'  Beard — ■ 
famous  for  his  discovery  of  neurasthenia — made 
no  reply,  but  Rockwell  did  not  desire  Cleven- 
ger's  exemption,  and  publicly  denied  that  he  had 
any  falling  out  with  Beard.  Reginald  Heber 
FiTZ,  while  thanking  Clevenger  for  a  reprint, 
explained  that  he  had  begun  a  thankless  task  if 
he  intended  rapidly  to  reform  the  profession  and 
that  most  Bostonians  had  renounced  the  public 
calling  of  names,  as  personal  abuse  never  digni- 
fies the  profession  of  medicine.  Dr  Fitz  added 
that  he  took  the  liberty  of  making  this  criticism 
from  the  interest  he  had  in  Clevenger's  progress 
and  from  the  somewhat  confidential  relation  in 
which  Clevenger  placed  him  early  in  his  medical 
career. 

On  the  other  hand,  Spitzka  approved  of 
Clevenger^s  animadversions — ^because  he  was 
not  a  Bostonian,  and  because  he  agreed  with  what 


156       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Clevenger  had  written.  It  seems,  however,  that 
Clevenger  was  a  trifle  hasty  with  his  hammer, 
for  within  a  decade  he  himself  announced  a  pos- 
sible electrical  treatment  for  cholera. 

In  this  year  Clevenger  became  a  contributor 
to  John  Michel's  'Science,'  his  first  article  be- 
ing his  deduction  that  love  is  hunger :  he  pointed 
out  that  as  monads  eat  each  other  and  then  fis- 
sion reproduction  occurs,  this  may  be  extended  to 
all  animal  life  as  indicating  that  the  sexual  act 
is  an  expression  of  hunger  and  that  love  is  de- 
rived from  hunger.  Naturally,  this  theory  of 
the  common  origin  and  fusion  of  the  sexual  and 
ingestive  act,  with  the  demonstration  that  in  some 
forms  of  life  the  sexual  act  is  identical  with  eat- 
ing, attracted  considerable  attention.  We  may 
add  that  in  the  light  of  this  theory,  the  common 
expression  of  lovers,  'you  look  sweet  enough  to 
eat,'  becomes  comprehensible. 

To  'Science,'  Clevenger  contributed  also  his 
theory  that  the  thymus  and  thyroid  are  rudimen- 
tary gills.  If  this  is  true  it  might  throw  some 
light  on  the  perplexing  subject  of  goitre,  but 
alas!  Clevenger  never  exhibited  any  interest  in 
proving  his  theories.  He  was  most  assiduous  in 
hatching  them,  but  neglected  them  as  soon  as 
they  came  into  the  world.     We  doubt  if  many 


Boohs  and  Essays  157 

scientists  during  1881  threw  so  many  brilliant 
and  unproved  hypotheses  into  the  field  as  Sho- 
BAL  Vail  Clevenger. 

In  the  following  year  Ci.evenger's  name  ap- 
peared seldom  in  print,  hut  he  was  preparing  sev^- 
eral  of  the  articles  which  were  published  in  1883 
— the  Dunning  year.  A  complete  bibhography 
of  his  writings  up  to  this  date,  and  a  complimen- 
tary notice  of  the  author,  appeared  in  the  July 
'Chicago  Medical  Journal  and  Examiner.'  This 
was  inserted  by  James  Nevins  Hyue,  the  well- 
known  professor  of  dermatology  at  Rush  Med- 
ical College ;  Davis  was  no  longer  one  of  the  ed- 
itors, as  he  was  now  editing  the  first  volume  of  the 
'Journal  of  the  American  JNIedical  Association.' 

That  Cle^tenger  already  ranked  with  the  lead- 
ers of  the  profession  is  apparent  from  a  notice 
which  appeared  in  the  'American  Journal  of 
Neurology  and  Psychiatry,'  a  quarterly  edited 
by  Edward  Charles  Spitzka,  Langdon  Car- 
ter Gray,  and  T.  A.  ^IcBride.  In  discussing 
their  prospects  for  the  coming  year,  the  editors 
stated : 

In  addition,  our  well-known  contributors,  S.  Weie 
Mitchell,  J.  S.  Jewell,  Roberts  Bartholow,  S. 
V.  Clevengek,  J.  G.  KiERNAN,  H.  M.  Bannister,  V. 
P.  GiBNEY,  D.  R.  Browser,  Burt  G.  Wilder  and  nu- 


158       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

merous  others,  will  continue  to  favor  us  with  the  re- 
sults of  their  researches  from  time  to  time. 

Clevenger  contributed  twice  to  the  'American 
Journal  of  Neurology  and  Psychiatry'  during 
1883:  a  report  on  the  Recent  Appearances  Ob- 
served Post  Mortem  in  a  Case  of  Delirium  Grave, 
in  August,  and  Insanity  in  Children^  in  Novem- 
ber. 

The  year  1884  opened  auspiciously  for  Clev- 
enger, for  the  January  'American  Naturalist' 
contained  his  Disadvantages  of  the  Upright  Po- 
sition. He  had  read  it  before  the  University 
Club  of  Chicago  in  1882,  and  before  the  Phila- 
delphia Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  in  1883. 
The  distribution  of  valves  in  the  veins  had  long 
been  a  standard  puzzle,  and  Clevenger  was  one 
of  those  who  determined  to  solve  it.  It  was  plain 
enough,  from  the  teleological  standpoint,  why 
we  should  have  valves  in  the  veins  of  the  arms 
and  legs:  obviously  to  assist  the  return  of  blood 
to  the  heart  against  gravitation.  But  what 
earthly  use,  wondered  Clevenger,  has  a  man  for 
valves  in  the  intercostal  veins  which  carry  blood 
almost  horizontally  backward  to  the  azygos 
veins?  When  recumbent,  these  veins  are  an  ac- 
tual detriment  to  the  free  flow  of  blood.  The 
inferior  thyroid  veins   which   drop   their  blood 


Books  and  Essays  169 

into  the  innominate  are  obstructed  by  valves  at 
their  junction.  Two  pairs  of  valves  are  situated 
in  the  external  jugular  and  another  pair  in  the 
internal  jugular,  but  in  recognition  of  their  use- 
lessness  they  do  not  prevent  regurgitation  of 
blood  nor  liquids  from  passing  upwards.  Fur- 
thermore, valves  are  absent  from  the  parts  where 
they  are  most  needed,  such  as  in  the  venae  cava?, 
spinal,  iliac,  hemorrhoidal  and  portal. 

Who  could  answer  this  riddle?  Not  any  of 
the  standard  text-books  of  the  time,  but  the  light 
came  to  Clevenger.  He  placed  man  upon  'all 
fours,'  and  the  law  governing  the  presence  and 
absence  of  valves  became  at  once  apparent :  dor- 
sad veins  are  valved ;  cephalad,  ventrad  and  cau- 
dad  veins  have  no  valves.  This  discovery  rep- 
resents Clevenger's  most  important  contribu- 
tion to  science.  It  was  another  fact  for  Darwin- 
ism. 

Clevenger  explained  that  valves  would  be  out 
of  place  in  the  hemorrhoidal  veins  of  quadrupeds, 
but  to  their  absence  in  man  many  a  life  has  been 
and  will  be  sacrificed,  to  say  nothing  of  the  dis- 
comfort and  distress  occasioned  by  the  engorge- 
ment known  as  piles,  which  the  presence  of 
valves  in  these  veins  would  obviate.  Besides  the 
law  of  valved  and  unvalved  veins,  Clevenger 


160       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

exposed  other  drawbacks  of  the  upright  posi- 
tion: 

He  pointed  out  that  a  noticeable  departure 
from  the  rule  obtaining  in  the  vascular  system 
of  mammalia  also  occurs  in  the  exposed  situation 
of  the  femoral  artery  in  man.  The  arteries  lie 
deeper  than  the  veins  or  are  otherwise  protected 
for  the  purpose,  the  teleologists  would  argue,  of 
preventing  hemorrhage  by  superficial  cuts. 
From  the  evolutionary  standpoint  it  would  ap- 
pear that  only  animals  with  deeply-placed  ar- 
teries would  survive  and  transmit  their  peculiari- 
ties to  their  offspring,  as  the  ordinary  abrasions 
to  which  all  animals  are  subject,  together  with 
their  fierce  onslaughts  upon  one  another,  would 
tend  to  kill  off  animals  with  superficially  located 
arteries.  But  when  man  assumed  the  upright 
posture,  the  femoral  artery,  instead  of  being 
placed  out  of  reach  on  the  inner  part  of  the^ 
thigh,  became  exposed,  and  were  it  not  that  this 
defect  is  nearly  fully  atoned  for  by  his  ability 
to  protect  the  exposed  artery  in  ways  the  brute 
could  not,  he  too  would  have  become  extinct. 
Even  as  it  is,  this  aberration  is  a  fruitful  cause  of 
trouble  and  death. 

Clevenger  next  pointed  out  that  another  dis- 
advantage which  occurs  in  the  upright  position 


Books  and  Enmys  161 

of  man  is  his  greiiter  liability  to  inguinal  hernia: 
Quadrupeds  have  the  main  weight  of  abdominal 
viscera  supported  by  ribs  and  strong  pectoral  and 
abdominal  muscles.  The  weakest  part  of  the  lat- 
ter group  of  muscles  is  in  the  region  of  Poupart's 
ligament,  above  the  groin.  Inguinal  hernia  is 
rare  in  other  vertebrates  because  this  weak  part 
is  relieved  of  the  visceral  stress,  but  about  twenty 
per  cent  of  the  hmnan  family  are  hernia  suffer- 
ers, and  strangulated  hernia  frequently  occasions 
death. 

He  then  showed  the  obstetric  peril  of  stand- 
ing erect;  From  marsupialia  to  lemuridee  the 
box-shape  pelvis  persists,  but  with  the  wedge- 
shape  induced  in  man  a  remarkable  phenomenon 
also  occurs  in  the  increased  size  of  the  fetal  head 
in  disproportion  to  the  contraction  of  the  pelvic 
outlet.  While  the  marsupial  head  is  about  one- 
sixth  the  size  of  the  smallest  part  of  the  parturi- 
ent bony  canal,  the  moment  we  pass  to  erect  ani- 
mals the  greater  relative  increase  is  there  in  the 
cranial  size  with  coexisting  decrease  in  the  area 
of  the  outlet.  This  altered  condition  of  things 
has  caused  the  death  of  millions  of  otherwise 
perfectly  healthy  and  well-formed  mothers  and 
children.  If  we  are  to  believe,  continued  Clev- 
ENGER,  that  for  our  original  sin  the  pangs  of 


162       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

labor  at  term  were  increased,  and  also  believe  in 
the  disproportionate  contraction  of  the  pelvic 
space  being  an  efficient  cause  of  the  same  diffi- 
culties of  parturition,  the  logical  inference  is  in- 
evitable that  man's  original  sin  consisted  in  his 
getting  upon  his  hind  legs. 

Clevenger's  star-essay  brought  him  a  sugges- 
tive letter  from  Lawrence  University — now  re- 
duced to  Lawrence  College — of  Appleton,  Wis- 
consin, written  by  a  Frank  Cramer  who  is  un- 
known to  us,  but  who  brings  upon  the  scene  the) 
geologist  and  evolutionist  Le  Conte,  one  of  the 
most  distinguished  of  American  naturalists: 

In  a  recent  correspondence  with  Prof.  Joseph  Le 
Conte,  he  called  my  attention  to  the  demonstrative  ar- 
gument for  evolution  that  may  be  drawn  from  the  dis- 
tribution of  the  valves  in  the  veins  of  the  human  body ; 
and  said  he  thought  the  point  was  first  brought  out  by 
Dr  Clevenger. 

I  have  been  seeking  a  number  of  typical  cases  of 
biological  investigations  that  will  demonstrate  the 
power  of  the  theory  of  evolution  to  direct  the  investi- 
gator, or  in  other  words,  to  give  him  the  ability  to  fore- 
see what  ought  to  be  looked  for  and  what  will  probably 
be  found.  Investigators  are  now  largely  occupied  in 
following  out  the  suggestions  of  the  theory  and  veri- 
fying the  deductions  that  flow  from  it,  but  while  every 


Boohs  and  Essays  168 

new  discovery  nowadays  strengthens  the  theory,  I  do 
not  know  of  any  effort  to  bring  together  those  that 
were  foreseen  as  deductions  of  the  theory,  as  Jevons 
has  so  beautifully  done  for  some  of  the  other  sciences. 

A  good  type  of  the  kind  of  discovery  to  which  I 
refer  is  given  by  some  of  Ehrenberg's  work.  From 
a  knowledge  of  the  structure  of  the  carpus  in  other 
animals  arose  the  deduction  that  if  the  theory  of  man's 
descent  was  the  true  one,  the  os  centrale  or  some  trace 
of  it  ought  to  be  found  in  the  wrist  of  the  hiunan  em- 
bryo. Following  this  deduction,  he  made  the  inves- 
tigation and  found  what  he  looked  for;  and  Wieder- 
SHEiM  pronounces  it  one  of  the  greatest  triumphs  of 
the  theory  in  the  whole  field  of  morphology. 

If  it  will  not  be  too  great  an  annoyance  to  you,  will 
you  please  give  me  the  order  in  which  the  facts  and 
deduction  ca^ne  to  you?  Did  the  theory  suggest  search 
for  the  facts  ?  or  did  you  know  the  facts  first  and  after- 
wards connect  them  with  the  theory.?  Or  did  parts  of 
the  facts  and  the  theory  together  lead  you  to  the  de- 
duction and  its  verification  by  farther  research.'' 

What  I  desire,  as  you  will  readily  see,  is  the  logical 
relation  wliich  the  facts  and  the  theory  bore  to  each 
other  in  your  own  mind. 

A  reply  directly  from  you  will  put  me  under  lasting 
obligations,  and  I  shall  await  it  with  great  interest. 

CusvENGER  believed  that  the  Disadvantages 
of  the  Upiight  Position^  when  originally  deliv- 


164       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ered  before  the  University  Club  of  Chicago,  had 
the  additional  disadvantage  of  costing  him  the 
proffered  chair  of  comparative  anatomy  and 
physiology  at  the  University  of  Chicago.  To  the 
printed  essay  he  appended  a  foot-note,  directing 
attention  to  the  institution's  antagonism  to  Dar- 
winism, flaying  it  as  a  tottering  university — a 
type  of  the  school  which  was  responsible  for  East- 
ern colleges  being  filled  with  Western  youth — 
and  calmly  predicting  that  it  would  be  five  hun- 
dred years  before  abstract  science  could  be  sup- 
ported in  Chicago. 

Edson  S.  Bastin,  who  was  the  professor  of 
botany,  but  incidentally  filled  all  the  other  scien- 
tific chairs  in  the  University  of  Chicago,  may 
not  have  cared  to  prophesy  five  hundred  years 
ahead,  but  he  could  testify  that  abstract  science 
in  Chicago  was  not  supporting  him  in  the  year 
1884,  for  he  was  then  engaged  in  suing  the  uni- 
versity for  his  salary.  He  wrote  to  Clevenger, 
who  was  then  pathologist  at  Dunning: 

I  notice  the  January  'Naturalist'  has  your  Disad- 
vantages of  the  Upright  Position,  with  a  blast  that 
will  awaken  the  sleepers,  in  the  form  of  a  foot-note  at 
the  end.  President  Andeeson  will  doubtless  think  hard 
of  me  if  the  article  meets  his  eye,  but  since  Dr  Garrison 
and  I  have  declared  war  on  the  institution  by  bringing 


Boohs  and  Essays  165 

suit  against  it  for  back  \nxy,  your  statements  will  only 
add  zest  to  tlie  contest.  I  have  suffered  enough  injus- 
tice at  the  hands  of  that  institution,  and  I  think  no 
hann  will  now  bo  done  if  one  great  Baptist  bubble  be 
pricked.     This  suh  rosa,  however. 

I  congratulate  you  on  your  valuable  article,  and 
thank  you  personally  for  the  kindly  mention  you  have 
made  of  me. 

I  am  sorry  I  so  seldom  meet  you  this  year.  I  very 
much  miss  the  pleasant  talks  we  were  accustomed  to 
have  together.  Do  call  on  me  when  you  come  into  the 
city. 

In  the  same  month  in  which  the  Disadvantages 
appeared  in  the  'American  Naturalist,'  Cleven- 
ger's  Paretic  Dementia  in  Females  appeared  in 
the  'Alienist  and  Neurologist,'  the  quarterly 
founded  and  so  long  edited  by  Charles  Ham- 
ilton Hughes,  of  St  Louis.  In  this  volume  of 
the  'Alienist  and  Neurologist,'  M.  J.  Madigan 
published  a  lengthy  treatise  on  Was  Giiiteau  In- 
sane? He  answered  the  question  in  the  affirma- 
tive, and  in  summing  up  the  most  eminent  neu- 
rologists, in  America  and  abroad,  who  adopted  a 
similar  view,  he  included  the  name  of  Cleyexger. 

In  Februarj^  in  the  'Chicago  INIedical  Journal 
and  Examiner,'  Clevenger  began  a  series  of 
Clinical  and  Pathological  Reports  of  Cases  of 


166       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Insanity,  taken  from  his  records  at  Dunning. 
The  first  case  he  reported  was  that  of  a  Swede 
who  was  suffering  from  melanchoHa  due  to  lead 
poisoning.  Clevenger  ended  his  remarks  with 
the  suggestion,  'Sanitary  boards  would  do  well 
to  examine  into  the  conduct  of  lead  factories,  and 
insist  upon  proper  measures  being  adopted  to 
protect  worlvmen  against  plumbic  toxemia.' 
Thirty-five  years  have  passed  since  these  words 
were  written,  but  the  slaughter  is  still  unabated. 
On  the  battlefields,  lead  kills  men  in  time  of  war, 
but  in  the  industries,  lead  kills  men — and  women 
— during  war  and  peace  alike. 

In  the  April  report,  he  used  the  word  paranoia 
— the  first  time  that  this  now-familiar  term  was 
employed  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic.  This 
paper  contained  his  deduction  that  females 
largely  inherit  their  insanity,  while  males  largely 
acquire  theirs.  We  quote  Clevenger's  original 
reference  to  paranoia: 

In  former  clinical  reports  I  mentioned  monomania  as 
a  misnomer,  and  suggested  that  a  name  conveying  the 
idea  of  logical  perversion  would  be  more  appropriate 
for  this  disorder.  Since  then  I  have  encountered  the 
term  paranoia,  as  used  by  GrosEPPE  Amadei  and  Silvio 
ToNNiNi,  for  this  form  of  insanity,  in  the  November, 
1883,  leading  article  of  the  'Archivio  Italiano  per  le 


CHARLES  HAMILTON  HUGHES 


Boohs  and  Essays  167 

Malattie  Nervo.so  e  Alienazoni  Montali,'  the  or^nn  of 
the  Italian  Societa  Frcniatrica,  and  in  the  expectation 
that  it  will  come  into  general  use  instead  of  the  word 
which  has  caused  so  much  misunderstanding,  have 
adopted  it. 

Clevengeii  concluded  this  strenuous  year  with 
a  monograph  on  Nervous  and  Mental  Physics,  in 
the  August  and  November  'American  Journal  of 
Neurology  and  Psychiatry.' 

The  outstanding  event  of  1885  was  the  appear- 
ance of  Clevenger's  second  book,  Com'parative 
Physiology  and  Psychology,  published  by  Jan- 
sen,  McClurg  &  Company,  of  Chicago.  This 
thoughtful  and  technical  production  was  ar- 
ranged for  the  printer  during  the  turmoil  at  the 
Dunning  Asylum,  tho  most  of  the  ideas  were 
taken  from  his  earlier  writings.  Like  the  true 
monist  that  he  was,  he  affirmed  that  mind  must 
be  regarded  as  a  mechanism  and  that  an  admis- 
sion of  the  supernatural  ends  investigation. 
Starting  with  the  immortal  ameba,  he  traced 
objectively  the  evolution  of  the  human  brain. 
Clevenger's  Comparative  Physiology  and  Psy- 
chology is  a  book  unmarred  by  a  superstition; 
theology  has  no  place  here,  teleology  is  flouted, 
and  metaphysics  is  defined  as  'lunar  politics ;'  the 


168        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

spirit  of  science  is  evoked  in  these  pages:  the 
author  lived  among  Mike  McDonald's  hench- 
men when  he  prepared  this  volume  for  the  press, 
but  he  stood  where  Ernest  Haeckel  stands, 
breathing  the  air  of  unadulterated  rationalism. 

In  January,  1886,  he  contributed  Neurological 
NoteSj  from  the  Alexian  Brothers  Hospital,  to 
the  'Western  Medical  Reporter.'  In  February, 
his  Contribution  to  Neurological  Therapeutics 
appeared  in  the  'Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental 
Disease.'  This  paper  was  a  plea  for  the  employ- 
ment of  secale  cornutum  in  neurology;  even  in 
epilepsy,  he  preferred  ergot  to  the  bromides.  As 
a  rule,  Clevenger  named  the  bromides  only  to 
condemn  them — in  which  respect  he  differed 
from  Beard  who  declared  the  bromides  a  specific 
ranking  with  opium,  quinine  and  electricity. 
Je^vell  had  been  unable  to  make  his  'Journal 
of  Nervous  and  Mental  Disease,'  pay  expenses, 
and  it  was  edited  by  W.  J.  Morton  from  1882  to 
1885,  but  was  now  piloted  by  Bernard  Sachs, 
under  whose  direction  it  was  transformed  from  a 
quarterly  to  a  monthly. 

The  'Journal  of  the  American  Medical  Asso- 
ciation,' founded  in  1883,  was  edited  by  Nathan 
Smith  Davis,  who  had  left  the  'Chicago  Medical 
Journal  and  Examiner'  for  that  purpose;  in  the 


Books  and  Essays  169 

second    volume,    Ci-kvenger's    nuiiie    .'ij)i)eare(l 
among  the  editorial  items: 

Dr  Ci.kv[':n(;kii,  of  this  city,  su^^csts  >i.s  a  ready 
means  of  ascertaining  tlic  existence  and  locations  of 
small  abrasions,  needing  a  touch  of  the  caustic  be- 
fore holding  a  post-mortem  examination,  the  holding 
of  the  hands  over  strong  aqua  ammonia  for  a  moment, 
when  the  smarting  will  quickly  reveal  all  the  sensitive 
or  abraded  places,  however  minute. 

There  were  further  references  to  him  in  this 
periodical,  but  his  first  contribution  to  the  'Jour- 
nal of  the  American  Medical  Association'  oc- 
curred during  1887,  when  his  Juiisiirudence  of 
Nervous  and  Mental  Disease,  which  he  had  read 
before  the  jurisprudence  section  of  the  American 
Medical  Association,  appeared  in  the  November 
issue. 

The  'American  Naturalist'  of  July,  1888,  con- 
tained Clevenger^s  Cerehrology  and  the  possible 
something  in  Phrenology,  explaining  the  few 
truths  in  old  phrenology  and  the  reasons  for  cere- 
hrology taking  the  place  of  fallacious  skull  read- 
ing. In  1873  Cle^^nger  had  paid  twenty-five 
dollars  to  the  self-styled  Professor  O.  S.  Fowler, 
for  a  phrenological  reading,  which  is  still  pre- 
served.    Fifteen  years  later,  the  scientific  Clev- 


170       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ENGER  returned  a  fitting  answer  to  this  ignorant 
and  pretentious  charlatan  who  was  never  brought 
to  justice. 

In  1886,  the  'American  Lithographer'  had 
pubHshed  the  lectures  which  Clevenger  de- 
livered at  the  Chicago  Academy  of  Fine  Ai'ts, 
in  the  capacity  of  instructor  of  artistic  anatomy. 
This  series  of  discourses  is  interesting  as  an  at- 
tempt to  bring  the  evolutionary  doctrine  into  the 
art  student's  domain,  and  the  class  certainly 
heard  more  of  Darwin  and  Spencer  than  of 
Raphael  and  Joshua  Reynolds.  Clevenger 
endeavored  to  show  the  relationship  that  exists 
between  science  and  the  arts,  and  he  pointed  out 
certain  errors  that  famous  artists  made  because 
of  their  unfamiliarity  with  anatomy  and  physics. 
It  was  characteristic  of  the  man  that  he  ter- 
minated his  course  with  an  adjuration  to  drop  the 
outworn  Joves  and  Venuses,  and  represent  mod- 
ern conditions.  Like  an  exhortation  from 
Kropotkin's  fiery  pamphlet.  An  Appeal  to  the 
Young,  is  Clevenger's  concluding  paragraph: 

There  exist  prison  brutalities  for  jou  to  expose. 
Charles  Reade  attempted  this  in  Never  Too  Late  to 
Mend,  and  in  his  Hard  Cash  he  gave  accounts  of  insane 
asylum  atrocities.  Such  works  as  his  and  Charles 
Dickens'    tales    of   Dothebojs   .Hall   have   done   some- 


Books  and  Essays  171 

thing  toward  instituting  reforms,  but  there  is  still  an 
immense  amount  of  labor  to  be  done.  I  have  been  per- 
sonally made  aware  of  the  hideous  management  of 
county  insane  asylums  by  bar-keeper  politicians,  and 
believe  that  were  the  artist  to  bring  the  real  state  of 
things  to  public  view  the  appeal  to  humanity  would  be 
more  effective  than  thru  rhetoric  or  'investigations'  in- 
tended to  exculpate  the  offender  and  hide  the  truth. 

After  this  series  had  been  printed  in  the  maga- 
zine, arrangements  were  made  to  bring  it  out 
in  book- form,  under  the  title.  Lectures  on  Artis- 
tic Anatomy.  Illustrations  were  secured,  and 
the  pages  were  electrotyped.  Most  appropri- 
ately the  volume  was  consecrated  to  the  memory 
of  his  father,  and  the  dedicatory  page  quoted  the 
beautiful  lines  that  Boston's  uncrowned  ruler, 
Edward  Everett,  addressed  to  the  sculptor  on 
receiving  the  bust  for  which  he  had  sat: 

Time,  care  and  sickness  bend  the  frame 
Back  to  the  dust  from  whence  it  came ; 
The  blooming  cheek,  the  sparkling  eye 
In  mournful  ruins  soon  must  lie; 
The  pride  of  form,  the  charm  of  grace 
Must  fade  away,  nor  leave  a  trace. 

They  shall  not  fade;  for  Art  can  raise 
A  counterpart  that  ne'er  decays : 


172       The  Don  Quiocote  of  Psychiatry 

Time,  care  and  sickness  strive  in  vain 
The  power  of  genius  to  restrain. 

Thou,  Clevenger,  from  lifeless  clay 
Canst  mould  what  ne'er  shall  fade  away, 
Fashion  in  stone  that  cannot  die, 
The  breathing  lip,  the  speaking  eye; 
And  while  frail  nature  sinks  to  dust. 
Create  the  all  but  living  bust. 

Everything  seemed  in  readiness  for  the  publi- 
cation, but  certain  parties  concerned  in  the  ven- 
ture were  guilty  of  delay,  and  this  dilatoriness 
caused  others  to  retreat,  and  the  plates  were  sent 
to  another  publisher,  and  then  to  still  another 
who  kept  them  a  twelvemonth,  and  finally 
shipped  them  to  a  firm  in  Chicago  where  they 
were  burnt  in  1888  in  a  printing-house  fire.  So 
nothing  now  remains  of  the  work  except  a  soli- 
tary dummy  bound  in  boards,  and  we  are  justi- 
fied in  claiming  that  the  Lectures  on  Artistid 
Anatomy  is  one  of  the  rarest  volumes  in  the 
world. 

But  Clevenger  was  already  roaming  in  fields 
far  removed  from  the  Chicago  Art  Institute. 
He  was  a  student  of  railways — he  was  studying 
those  vague  and  ambiguous  injuries  to  the  nerv- 
ous system,  often  received  in  railway  accidents. 


Books  and  Essays  173 

in  which  the  anatomical  changes  in  the  spinal 
column  are  either  ahsent,  indefinite,  or  iindemon- 
strable,  but  which  leave  the  victim  a  neurasthenic 
wreck.  The  'railway  spine'  had  been  discovered 
in  England  by  John  Eric  Eiuchsen,  who  was 
born  in  Copenhagen — and  certain  Englishmen 
heartily  wished  he  had  remained  in  his  native 
land,  whether  there  is  something  rotten  in  Den- 
mark or  not.  But  Erichsen  matriculated  at 
the  University  College  of  London,  and  eventu- 
ally became  professor  in  that  institution, — where 
he  taught  Lister — winning  much  admiration  by 
his  lectures  and  clinical  work.  He  was  president 
of  the  College  of  Surgeons,  and  of  the  Royal 
Medical  and  Chirurgical  Society,  and  after  being 
surgeon-extraordinary  to  Queen  Victoria,  was 
created  a  baronet.  His  Science  and  Art  of 
Surgery  passed  thru  several  editions,  and  Erich- 
sen  is  counted  among  the  makers  of  modern 
surgery. 

His  Concussion  of  the  Spine  made  his  name  a 
storm-center,  as  the  corporations  naturally  took 
the  ground  that  the  owners  of  the  railway  spine 
were  simply  shamming.  Herbert  W.  Page 
wrote  a  volume  to  prove  that  the  railway  spine 
was  a  mj^th,  but  the  enormous  smiis  which  Eng- 
lish jm*ies  awarded  the  plaintiffs  were  exceed- 


174       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ingly  substantial,  and  involved  the  opposing 
physicians  in  the  bitterest  acrimony.  Eleven 
million  dollars  in  damages,  within  five  years,  for 
a  new  disease,  cannot  be  doled  out  with  a  smile. 

The  warfare  extended  across  the  Atlantic,  and 
in  the  eighties  Spitzka  wrote  on  Spinal  Injuries 
as  a  Basis  of  Litigation,  and  J.  J.  Putnam  and 
G.  L.  Walton  pointed  out  the  hysterical  nature 
of  the  malady.  Clevenger  then  attacked  the 
problem ;  moderation  was  never  his  middle  name, 
and  he  became  Erichsen's  warmest  advocate. 
In  1889,  the  F.  A.  Davis  Company  of  Phila- 
delphia, brought  out  Clevenger's  Spinal  Con- 
cussionj  'surgically  considered  as  a  cause  of 
spinal  injury,  and  neurologically  restricted  to  a 
certain  symptom  group,  for  which  is  suggested 
the  designation  Erichse^is  disease,  as  one  form  of 
the  traumatic  neuroses,' — this  being  the  first  time 
that  concussion  of  the  spine  was  called  Erichsen's 
disease. 

Clevenger  reviewed  and  analysed  the  available 
literature  on  the  subject,  and  then  worked  out  his 
own  theory  that  injury  to  the  sympathetic  nerve 
fibrils  between  the  spinal  cord  and  anterior  sym- 
pathetic spinal  ganglia  accounted  for  much  of^ 
the  phenomena  in  this  traumatic  neurosis. 

To  find  concussion  of  the  spine  regarded  as  a 


Books  and  Essays  175 

clinical  entity,  and  his  own  name  eponymic,  was 
naturally  agreeable  to  Sir  John  Eric  Euiciisen, 
and  he  sent  Clevengkr  this  cordial  letter: 

Pray  accept  my  best  thanks  for  the  copy  of  your 
work  on  Spmal  Concussion  which  I  have  just  received 
from  your  publishers.  The  subject  seems  to  be  most 
admirably  and  exhaustively  treated  by  you. 

I  assure  you  that  I  feel  much  gratified  and  very 
highly  flattered  by  having  my  name  appended  by  you 
to  the  group  of  symptoms — so  very  characteristic  and 
unmistakable  when  taken  in  the  concrete — which  I  be- 
lieve I  was  the  first  to  describe,  which  results  from  that 
peculiar  form  of  spinal  injury  now  recognized  under 
the  term  of  'Spinal  Concussion.' 

Nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century  has  passed  since  I 
first  wrote  on  the  subject,  and  it  is  a  matter  of  sin- 
cere gratification  to  me  to  find  that  the  views  I  then 
entertained,  and  the  opinions  I  gave  utterance  to, 
have  in  great  measure  been  accepted  by  such  distin- 
guished neurologists  as  yourself,  Eeb  and  others. 

Altho  the  mere  phrase,  'spinal  concussion,'  was 
provocative  of  ire,  Clevenger  aroused  a  little 
extra  animosity  by  such  cogitations  as  the  fol- 
lowing: 


^o 


It  is  sad  to  reflect,  however,  that  the  majority  of 
medical  men  in  our  country  have  never  seen  a  human 


176       The  Don  Quiooote  of  Psychiatry 

spinal  cord  and  would  not  recognize  one  if  they  did  see 
it. 

Clevenger's  Spinal  Concussion  was  the  signal 
for  a  renewal  of  the  battle:  followers  rallied  to 
his  defence  and  pronounced  his  theory  the  most 
plausible  that  had  yet  appeared,  while  it  was  the 
vociferous  contention  of  his  opponents  that, 
Erichsens  disease  should  be  named  'blackmailer's 
disease,'  as  the  litigants  were  speedily  cured  upon 
receipt  of  damages. 

The  spread  of  periodical  literature  in  the  nine- 
teenth century  put  an  end  to  the  importance  of 
the  pamphlet,  but  'railway  spine'  had  its  pam- 
phleteer in  Dr  G.  M.  Dewey,  of  Keytesville, 
Missouri.  From  his  eight-page  lampoon  we  cite 
these  passages: 

A  new  disease  to  trouble  men 

Has  come  to  light  thru  Erichsen; 

Wlio  ever  heard,  before  his  time, 

Of  such  complaint  as  'railway  spine'? 

It  was  the  purpose  of  the  Lord 

To  save  from  harm  the  spinal  cord. 

Protection  for  the  cord  was  made 

Before  a  railway  track  was  laid. 

Enclosed  within  a  solid  case. 

It  seemed  secure  for  all  the  race; 


LETTER    FR05t    JOHN    ERIC   ERICHSEK 


177 


178       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

A  bony  process  on  each  side, 
No  evil  from  it  could  betide; 
An  osseous  column  from  behind 
In  close  proximity  we  find; 
In  front  a  solid  fort  we  see 
The  bodies  of  the  vertebrae ; 
To  make  the  cord  still  more  secure, 
From  shock  and  violence  insure. 
The  spine  was  made  of  many  cones, 
With  cartilage  between  the  bones ; 
A  great  success  this  would  have  been. 
But  for  John  Eric  Erichsen  ; 
But  ever  since  he  wrote  his  book, 
The  spinal  cord  is  getting  shook. 
And  scarce  a  term  of  court  goes  by. 
That  does  not  have  a  case  to  try. 
The  slightest  bruise,  the  merest  jar. 
If   gotten   on  a  railway   car, 
Is  sure  to  end  in  course  of  time 
In  a  concussion  of  the  spine.  .  .  . 

There  seems  to  be  an  inclination 
In  men  to  rob  a  corporation. 
So  common  is  this  thing  of  late 
That  stealing  seems  legitimate.    .   .   . 
The  damage  by  the  jury  set. 
Attorneys  half  the  boodle  get.  .  .  . 
No  ante,  or  postmortem  sign. 
Can  diagnose  a  'railway  spine ;' 


Boohs  and  Essays  179 

Tiie  microscope  is  sought  in  vain 
The  dubious  symptoms  to  explain; 
Subjective  signs,  if  signs   at  all — 
An  open  door  for  fraud  for  all. 
Away  with  fairness,  truth  and  skill. 
While  men  malinger  at  their  will. 
What  can  be  done,  what  can  avail, 
In  shock  from  the  pernicious  rail? 
Of  antiseptics,  none  are  sure 
To  even  make  a  transient  cure; 
Nerve  tonics,  very  often  tried. 
Failing,  have  all  been  laid  aside; 
Neurosthenics  without  name, 
Have  not  relieved  a  single  pain ; 
The  iodides,  when  in  some  doubt, 
Will  often  help  a  doctor  out; 
Have  not,  up  to  the  present  time. 
Relieved  a  case  of  'railway  spine;' 
One  remedy  that  never  fails. 
In  shocks  from  the  pernicious  rails; 
In  all  conditions  it  is  sure 
To  make  a  quick,  a  speedy  cure; 
Specifics  may  be  flaunted  at. 
And  much  of  charlatanry  smack ; 
But  greenbacks  have  not  failed  thus  far 
To  heal  the  direct  railway  jar. 

Of  late  there's  sprung  some  Western  men 
Who  may  eclipse  John  Erichsen; 


180       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Chicago  has   produced  a  man 
Who  now  stands  foremost  in  the  van ; 
Clevengeu  has  at  last  found  out 
The  great  morbific  cause,  no  doubt; 
Wliile  on  the  gentle  sleeper  rocked, 
The  sympathetic  nerve  gets  shocked; 
He  puts  this  theory  in  his  book. 
Where  all  may  see  it  if  they  look; 
And  every  pain  that  flesh  is  heir 
Is  put  down  as  a  symptom  there. 
The  book  was  writ  beyond  a  doubt 
To  help  the  rascal  plaintiffs  out. 
The  writer  seems  in  quite  a  rage 
To  counteract  the  views  of  Page; 
The  only  thing  he  claims  as  new 
Is  the  great  sympathetic  view. 
The  ganglions  spend  all  their  time 
In  getting  up  a  'railway  spine ;' 
Since  this  new  function  they  have  got, 
Against  the  cord  they  daily  plot. 
These  writers   on  the   record   go 
For  what  they  think,  not  what  they  know. 
The  cord  was  safe  up  to  the  time 
John  Eric  made  the  'railway  spine;' 
Now  every  day  some  fellows  get 
Their  sympathetic  nerves  upset. 
And  to  the  law  in  haste  appeal, 
Where  juries   will  condone  the  steal. 


Books  and  Essays  181 

The  'Alienist  and  Neurologist,'  for  July,  1800, 
contained  Ct-evionoer's  Infant  Frodujy,  the 
story  of  Oscar  M  oore,  of  Waco,  Texas.  Oscar 
was  a  niidatto,  blind  from  birth,  and  while  still 
in  his  cradle  he  corrected  his  elder  brothers  and 
sisters  who  stumbled  over  the  multiplication- 
table.  As  Brann  the  Iconoclast  also  hailed 
from  Waco,  little  Oscar  could  not  claim  to  be 
the  only  phenomenon  that  came  out  of  that  town, 
but  he  was  wellworth  scientific  attention.  When 
he  came  under  Clevenger^s  notice  in  Chicago,  he 
was  three  years  old,  and  already  had  a  marvelous 
stock  of  information — enough  to  fill  a  handbook ; 
whatever  he  heard  he  remembered,  whether  it 
was  the  population  of  American  cities,  a  speech 
on  the  tariff,  or  a  prayer  in  Chinese.  He  could 
recite  poems  in  various  languages,  and  could  re-, 
peat  an  astonishing  array  of  statistics.  Clev- 
ENGER  exhibited  him  in  the  Central  JMusic  Hall, 
and  as  the  sightless  colored  child  stood  on  the 
platform  in  his  golden  cage,  answering  question 
after  question  which  the  assembled  physicians 
asked  him,  he  was  indeed  an  enigma.  At  the 
request  of  Henry  ]M.  Lyman,  the  professor  of, 
neurology,  Clevenger  exhibited  his  prodigy  to 
the  students  of  the  Rush  Medical  College. 
Gould   and   Pyle   quote   Clevenger's   Infant 


182       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Prodigy  in  their  volume  of  endless  fascination, 
Anomalies  and  Curiosities  of  Medicine.  Unfor- 
tunately, Oscar  did  not  survive  childhood.  In 
October,  Clevenger  had  another  article  in  the 
'Alienist  and  Neurologist,'  on  Heart  Disease  in 
Insanity  and  a  Case  of  Panphobia. 

During  this  year  the  American  Medical  Asso- 
ciation met  at  Nashville,  Tennessee,  and  Clev- 
enger was  one  of  the  participants,  but  was  prob- 
ably more  interested  in  revisiting  the  scenes  of 
his  old  army  days  than  in  attending  the  meetings : 
he  found  that  the  barracks  which  he  had  used  for 
his  recruits  had  become  an  hotel,  and  the  fort  on 
the  hill  was  displaced  by  Fisk  University,  but 
when  a  native  spoke  to  him,  Clevenger  heard 
that  the  Dixie  dialect  was  still  unchanged.  At 
the  jurisprudence  section,  Clevenger  did  some 
propaganda  work  by  reading  a  paper  on  Erich- 
sens  Disease  as  a  Form  of  the  Traumatic 
Neuroses.  His  views  were  tartly  attacked  by 
Herbert  Judd  and  Clarke  Gapen,  but  he  was 
amply  defended  by  Harold  N.  Moyer  and 
James  G.  Kiernan,  while  Professor  Lydston 
declared,  'Clevenger's  explanation  of  the  path- 
ology of  the  varying  phenomena  of  spinal  con- 
cussion is  thus  far  the  only  rational  and  intel- 
ligible one  in  medical  literature.'     Clevenger's 


Books  and  Essays  188 

paper  appeared  as  the  leading  article  in  both  the 
'Journal  of  the  American  Medical  Association,' 
and  in  the  'Boston  Medical  and  Surgical  Jour- 
nal.' 

But  by  1890,  Clevenger's  research  work  was 
over,  and  he  began  to  write  various  brief  and 
ephemeral  articles  for  the  general  medical  press ; 
the  'Medical  Standard,'  whose  editors  have  al- 
ways been  anonymous,  received  some  of  these; 
his  Inebriety  Notes  ran  thru  three  issues  of  T.  D. 
Crothehs'  'Quarterly  Journal  of  Inebriety;'  he 
wrote  Physics  in  a  Pharmacy  Course  for  the 
'Western  Druggist,'  and  contributed  copiously 
to  the  Philadelphia  weekly,  'The  Times  and 
Register,'  which  had  formerly  been  conducted  by 
Horatio  C.  Wood,  and  was  now  under  the  edi- 
torship of  William  Francis  Waugh.  Dr 
Waugh  was  a  pupil  of  Samuel  David  Gross, 
but  developed  into  an  internist  instead  of  a  sur- 
geon; he  was  a  founder  of  the  Medico-Chirur- 
gical  College,  and  its  first  professor  of  medicine ; 
in  an  era  of  therapeutic  doubt,  Waugh  had  a 
positive  faith  in  drugs — sometimes  more  positive 
than  scientific.  He  was  a  forward-looking  phy- 
sician, and  one  of  the  best  editorial  writers  in  the 
profession — which  is  perhaps  a  half-hearted 
compliment,  since  nearly  all  our  editorial  writers 


184       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

•are  utterly  execrable.  Waugh  originated  cer- 
tain intestinal  antiseptics  and  astringents  for  fer- 
mentative diarrhea,  such  as  the  sulphocarbolate 
of  zinc,  that  Clevenger  applauded  as  un- 
equalled, but  Clevenger  regarded  Waugh 's 
later  connexion  with  the  Abbott  Alkaloidal 
Company  as  unfortunate — for  Waugh.  Clev- 
enger and  Waugh  were  kindred  spirits,  and 
there  was  a  sympathetic  understanding  between 
the  two  men. 

In  Waugh's  journal  he  published  his  Address 
to  the  Chicago  Academy  of  Medicine;  it  is  a 
compendium  of  muckraking,  and  in  showing  that 
science  and  politics  make  a  monstrous  combina- 
tion, Clevenger  wandered  as  far  afield  as  pale- 
ontology: 'Professor  Cope,'  he  asserted,  'has 
shown  that  the  official  geological  surveys  are  de- 
bauched by  pseudo-scientists  who  publish  great 
volumes  of  falsehoods  at  the  government's  ex- 
pense ;  and  recent  exposures  have  damned  official 
American  paleontology  for  all  time  in  necessitat- 
ing the  rewriting  of  text-books  that  assumed  the 
alleged  discoveries  as  true.'  This  was  a  slap  at 
Professor  Marsh,  of  Yale,  whom,  however,  he 
does  not  name.  There  are  those  who  say  that 
Othniel  Charles  Marsh  had  few  peers  as  a 
paleontologist,  but  we  need  not  advance  our  own 


0M^^  ^i^^^^^'-^-^^c^.^,^^. 


Books  and  Essays  185 

opinion,  since  it  has  become  the  fashion  to  refer 
all  paleontological  problems  to  Heney  Fair- 
field  OSBORN. 

This  address  had  been  delivered  at  the  organi- 
zation meeting  of  the  Academy,  Ci.evenger  })cing 
one  of  its  founders  and  its  first  secretary.  How 
much  such  a  society  was  desired  in  Chicago  is  evi- 
denced by  the  fact  that  the  foremost  physicians 
and  surgeons  of  the  city  became  Fellows,  and 
either  read  papers  at  the  monthly  meetings  or 
took  part  in  the  discussions.  Among  its  Active 
Fellows  were  Nicholas  Senn,  John  B.  Mur- 
phy, John  Ridlon,  William  Augustus  Evans, 
LuDwiG  Hektoen,  Henry  Gradle,  W.  S. 
Christopher,  Casey  A.  Wood,  Daniel  R. 
Brovter,  James  G.  Kiernan,  Henry  M. 
Bannister,  E.  C.  Dudley,  G.  F.  Lydston, 
Eugene  S.  Talbot,  Arthur  Dean  Bevan, 
William  Allen  Pusey,  Hugh  T.  Patrick, 
William  Francis  Waugh,  when  he  became  a 
Chicagoan,  and  Harriet  Alexander,  who  must 
have  been  a  learned  woman,  since  Kiernan 
quoted  her  so  frequently.  But  altho  the  Chicago 
Academy  of  Medicine  officially  professed  to  be 
modeled  after  the  New^  York  Academy  of  iMedi- 
cine,  within  a  comparatively  few  years  it  ceased 
to  exist.     In  simple  language  Truthful  James 


186       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

of  Table  Mountain  explained  what  broke  up  the 
proceedings  of  the  scientific  society  upon  the 
Stanislau,  but  we  have  never  been  able  to  ascer- 
tain what  caused  the  Chicago  Academy  of  Medis 
cine  to  disband — perhaps  because  Dr  Kiernan 
quoted  Dr  Harriet  too  often. 

In  1891,  Clevenger  continued  his  miscel- 
lanea: he  wrote  for  the  'Western  Medical  Re- 
porter,' the  'North  American  Practitioner,'  and 
began  Psychological  Studies  of  Physicians  for 
the  'Medical  Progress'  of  Louisville.  Number 
One  was  a  comparison  between  honest  old  Paoli 
and  HoLLiSTER  whom  he  described  under  the 
name  of  Dr  Oleaginous.  Psychological  Study 
Number  Two  never  appeared — but  what  writer 
has  not  promised  an  editor  a  series  of  articles 
and  then  failed  to  write  them?  The  'Times  and 
Register'  of  July  fourth,  contained  Clevenger's 
Softening  of  the  Brain,  in  which  he  showed  that 
this  omnibus  term  has  no  place  in  scientific 
nomenclature.  Two  of  his  articles  appeared  in 
the  'American  Naturalist'  during  this  year:  The 
Coming  Man,  in  July,  and  in  November,  han- 
guage  and  Maoc  Milller,  in  which  he  criticized 
certain  of  the  theories  of  this  famous  philologist. 
It  was  no  trouble  for  Clevenger  to  criticize 
anyone. 


Boohs  and  Essays  187 

During  1892,  he  wrote  various  notes  for 
'Science,'  such  as  Preliminary  Note  on  Sleep, 
and  the  longer  Brain  and  Skull  Correlations. 
To  the  'Times  and  Register'  he  contributed  the 
Acid  Prevention  of  Cholera,  suggesting  the 
acidulation  of  the  lower  bowel  by  galvanism,  as 
the  cholera  germ  thrives  in  the  alkaline  intestinal 
fluids,  but  is  destroyed  by  acid.  Many  of  the, 
journals  that  have  been  named  above,  especially 
Waugh's  magazine,  were  now  the  beneficiaries 
of  his  prolific  pen,  but  most  of  his  contributions 
were  either  'fillers'  or  re-statements  of  his  former 
ideas.  A  brief  address  before  the  Evolution 
Club  on  Nervous  and  Mental  Asjjects  on  Vivi- 
section, showing  the  value  of  animal  experimen- 
tation in  neurology  and  psychiatry,  appeared  in 
the  'Religio-Philosophical  Journal;'  a  more 
formal  address,  before  the  Chicago  Academy  of 
Medicine,  on  Natural  Analogies,  was  published 
in  the  'American  Naturalist.'  At  the  request  of 
Mr  Clark  Bell  he  wrote  a  short  autobiograph- 
ical sketch  for  the  'INIedico-Legal  Journal,'  but 
in  spite  of  the  implied  compliment,  Clevenger 
had  a  poor  opinion  of  Clark  Bell,  Esquire — in 
which  opinion  we  cheerfully  concur.  A  medico- 
legal editor  who  fills  his  pages  with  astrology, 
simply  advertises  his  asininity. 


188       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

During  1893,  further  notes  appeared  in  'Sci- 
ence,' and  the  'Times  and  Register'  was  not  for- 
gotten, but  no  noteworthy  production  issued 
from  his  pen.  The  medical  press,  however,  ex- 
ists on  ephemera. 

In  1894,  Clevenger's  Sleep,  Sleeplessness  and 
Hypnotics  appeared  in  the  'Journal  of  the 
American  Medical  Association,'  which  had  not 
yet  commenced  its  assaults  on  proprietaries,  for 
this  contribution  was  really  a  eulogy  of  chloral- 
amid.  Lehn  &  Fink  promptly  put  this  pane- 
gyric in  pamphlet-form,  and  mailed  copies  to 
physicians  all  over  the  country.  The  article  had 
appeared  originally  in  March,  and  by  November} 
this  firm  had  distributed  twenty-five  thousand 
reprints.  So  at  last  Clevenger  was  a  popular 
medical  author.  Neglect  has  now  descended 
upon  chloralamid,  and  under  its  full-dress  name 
of  chloralformamidum  it  is  no  longer  official,  but 
Clevenger  always  regarded  it  as  the  best  of  hyp- 
notics and  the  safest  of  sleep-producers.  In 
November  of  this  year,  Clevenger's  Mysopho- 
hia,  a  case  report  of  insane  dread  of  contamina- 
tion, was  published  in  the  'Western  Medical  Re- 
porter.' 

For  the  next  few  years,  Clevenger's  contribu- 
tions   to    periodical    literature    were    confined 


Books  and  Essays  189 

largely  to  the  'Journal  of  the  American  Medical 
Association.'  In  Conservative  Brain  Surgery, 
which  was  puhlishcd  in  June,  189.'5,  he  flayed  Dr 
Lanpheaii,  who  in  Ijcclures  on  Intracranial 
Surgery,  had  claimed  impossi})ly  brilliant  results 
in  operative  cerebrology.  Emory  Lanpiiear 
may  have  been  shocked  at  this  criticism,  but  since 
that  time  he  has  been  exposed  so  frequently  that 
he  must  have  acquired  immunity  to  ethical  at- 
tacks. Clevenger's  Post-Alcoholiwi  appeared 
in  the  'Journal  of  the  American  Medical  Asso- 
ciation,' during  October. 

The  'Journal  of  the  American  Medical  Asso- 
ciation' of  February,  1896,  published  the  final 
version  of  Clevenger's  The  Mercurials — a  thesis 
upon  which  he  had  been  working  since  his  school- 
days, his  preliminary  reports  having  appeared, 
in  the  eighties,  in  the  'Chicago  Medical  Review,' 
'Chicago  Medical  Journal  and  Examiner,' 
'Ajnerican  Journal  of  Microscopy,'  'Chicago 
Druggist,'  and  'Galliard's  Medical  Journal.' 
Taking  as  his  text,  the  words  of  Franklin 
Bache,  'Of  the  modus  operandi  of  mercury  we 
know  nothing,  except  that  it  acts  thru  the  medi- 
um of  the  circulation,  and  that  it  possesses  a 
peculiar  alterative  power  over  the  vital  functions, 
which  enables  it  in  many  cases  to  subvert  diseased 


190       The  Don  Qiiivote  of  Psychiatry 

actions,'  Clevenger  proceeded  to  investigate  its 
microscopy,  chemistry,  toxicology,  physiological 
action  and  therapeutics. 

The  chief  result  of  these  studies  was  Clev- 
enger's  mechanical  explanation  of  the  mercurials 
in  therapeusis.  He  took  the  ground  that  mercury 
acts  mechanically  as  a  deobstruent  upon  the 
glands  and  lesser  tubular  structures,  by  virtue 
of  its  unstable  chemic  properties,  its  volatility 
and  great  weight,  claiming  that  all  the  salts  of 
mercury  are  reduced  to  oxides  and  mercurial 
globules,  exerting  their  pecuhar  effects  mainly 
by  their  occluding  action  upon  the  minute  tubules 
of  the  body,  the  syphilitic  organism  being  en- 
closed by  the  mercury  globules  acting  similarly 
to  phagocytes  in  passing  the  micro-organism  to- 
ward the  emunctories. 

Clevengee's  experimentation  was  certainly 
suggestive,  and  to  no  other  one  subject  was  he 
faithful  for  so  extended  a  period,  but  contem- 
porary text-books  describe  mercury  without 
mentioning  Clevenger's  researches — and  we 
confess  that  our  acquaintance  with  the  dynamics 
of  hydrargyrum  is  insufficient  to  enable  us  to 
judge  whether  the  text-books  or  Clevenger's| 
researches  are  at  fault.  It  should  be  stated  that 
former  editions  of  Horatio  C.  Wood's  standard 


Boohs  and  Essays  191 

Therapeutics  carried  a  foot-note  reference  to 
Clevenger's  The  Mercurials,  but  even  this  foot- 
note has  disappeared.  According  to  Clevenger, 
Professor  Wood  deleted  this  foot-note  from  later 
editions  of  his  text-book  because  in  the  meantime 
Clevenger  had  criticized  Wood's  granular 
medulla  of  hydrophobia  as  an  alcohol  preserva- 
tive artefact,  and  in  revenge  the  angry  Wood 
resolved  to  advertise  Clevenger  no  more.  We 
trust  that  this  version  is  not  strictly  accurate, 
but  it  is  true  that  Clevenger  could  have  col- 
laborated with  Whistler  in  writing  the  Gentle 
Art  of  Making  Enemies. 

In  the  same  month  that  The  Mercurials  was 
published,  Clevenger  contributed  Some  Mis- 
leading Medical  Misnomers  to  Edward  C. 
Register's  'Charlotte  Medical  Journal,'  which 
was  almost  as  worthless  a  periodical  then  as  it  is 
today.  Clevenger's  article,  however,  was  a  val- 
uable one,  for  he  inveighed  against  descriptive 
naming  in  medicine,  and  pleaded  for  eponymic 
terms.  Explaining  that  electricians  secured  pre- 
cision by  avoiding  descriptive  phrases,  and  adopt- 
ing such  eponyms  as  farad,  watt,  ampere,  ohm, 
faradic,  galvanic,  franklinic,  after  the  discoverers 
of  these  measurements  and  currents,  Clevenger 
pointed  out  that  if  the  condition  first  described 


192        The  Don  Quivote  of  Psychiatry 

by  Bayle  had  been  named  Bayle's  disease  in- 
stead of  paretic  dementia,  or  general  paralysis 
of  the  insane,  or  progressive  paresis,  much  con- 
fusion would  have  been  avoided,  and  profession 
and  public  would  be  compelled  to  learn  just  what 
symptoms  constitute  Bayle's  disease  instead  of 
guessing  at  them  from  the  descriptive  title.  The 
Basle  Anatomical  Nomenclature  is  triumphant 
today,  but  we  predict — at  least  we  hope — it  will 
be  superseded  by  a  nomenclature  that  adopts, 
instead  of  abandoning,  eponyms,  tho  of  course 
there  is  more  excuse  for  descriptive  terms  in 
anatomy  than  in  any  of  the  clinical  branches  of 
medicine. 

In  May  of  this  year,  Clevenger's  Treatment 
of  the  Insane  was  read  by  title  in  the  section  of 
State  Medicine  at  the  annual  meeting  of  the 
American  Medical  Association,  held  at  Atlanta, 
Georgia,  and  appeared  in  the  'Journal  of  the 
American  Medical  Association,'  for  Oct6ber.  It 
was  a  review  of  the  methods  of  treating  the  insane 
in  various  countries  and  ages — fourteen  long 
columns  of  infamies  and  horrors. 

In  January,  1897,  the  'Journal  of  the  Ameri- 
can Medical  Association'  published  Clevengee's 
Pain  and  its  Therapeusis^  in  which  he  wrote  that 
lactophenin  'is  destined  largely  to  supersede  the 


Boohs  and  "Essays  103 

entire  array  of  analgesics  proper,  owing  to  its 
non-toxic  peculiarities'  and  other  virtues.  Ci.ev- 
enger's  prophecies  were  numerous,  but  nearly 
always  incorrect — the  usual  fate  of  predictions; 
in  spite  of  his  foretokening  a  gi-eat  future  for 
lactophenin,  it  is  now  regarded  merely  as  a  weak 
brother  of  phenacetin.  Pain  and  its  Therapeu- 
sis  was  Clevenger's  last  article  in  the  'Journal 
of  the  American  Medical  Association,'  and  it 
represents — with  the  exception  of  a  few  minor 
reports  in  unimportant  periodicals — his  final  con- 
tribution to  medical  journalism. 

In  the  following  year,  1898,  when  he  was  fifty- 
five  years  of  age,  appeared  his  biggest  book — the 
Medical  Junsprudence  of  Insanity,  published  in 
two  stately  volumes  by  the  Lawyers'  Co-opera- 
tive Publishing  Company,  of  Rochester,  New 
York.  Certainly  it  contains  considerable  valu- 
able information  on  forensic  psychiatry,  and 
Clevenger  was  immensely  proud  of  this 
achievement,  and  of  course  some  of  his  friends — 
like  attorney  Luther  Laflin  JNIills — told  him 
it  was  the  best  treatise  on  the  subject  in  any 
language,  but  it  has  not  reached  a  second  edition, 
and  never  will,  and  it  did  not  rank  the  name  of 
Clevenger  with  Theodoric  Romeyn  Beck, 
Isaac  Ray,  John  Ordronaux,  and  John  James 


194       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Reese.  In  brief,  Clevenger^s  large  Medical 
Jurisprudence  of  Insanity  is  not  a  landmark  in 
legal  medicine. 

Dr  Clevenger  claimed  this  work  was  based 
on  memoranda  that  he  had  been  gathering  for 
a  generation;  to  collect  notes  is  commendable, 
but  they  must  be  put  together  so  the  patches  do 
not  show.  In  the  finished  statue,  the  scaffolding 
should  not  be  seen.  Previous  writings,  quota- 
tions from  others,  personal  observations,  news- 
paper clippings,  bunches  of  odds  and  ends,  ex- 
traneous and  adventitious  comments,  and  addi- 
tional knowledge,  must  be  slowly  and  skilfully 
moulded  into  homogeneity.  Several  of  his  pas- 
sages read  like  hastily-scribbled  jottings  that 
have  been  pulled  out  of  a  drawer,  instead  of  well- 
considered  and  final  phrases.  One  of  the  chiefj 
defects  of  Clevenger's  books  is  that  they  are  not 
organic  buildings  raised  anew,  but  are  second- 
hand structures  put  together  from  previous 
pieces.  It  is  true  that  the  blocks  he  uses  are  his 
own,  but  when  once  employed  elsewhere  they 
cannot  fit  so  well  into  future  work  unless  plenty! 
of  cement  is  applied.  In  the  Medical  Jurispru- 
dence of  Insanity,  there  is  a  discursiveness  and 
diffuseness  all  thru  the  volumes,  and  we  miss 
the  conciseness,  the   systematized  classification. 


Books  and  Essays  195 

and  those  sonorous  sentences  that  we  find  with 
pleasure  in  Spitzka. 

For  example,  the  lengthy  chapter  on  Treat- 
ment is  suggestive  and  interesting,  but  it  is  so 
mal-arranged  that  if  we  wish  to  look  up  a  cer- 
tain line  of  therapy,  or  wish  to  find  a  list  of  drugs 
employed  in  insanity,  we  must  hunt  thru  the  en- 
tire chapter ;  obviously,  it  would  have  been  better 
to  discuss  the  subject  in  logical  order:  first,  the 
prophylactic  and  psychical  treatment,  then  the 
dietetic  and  hygienic  treatment,  finally  the  medic- 
inal and  surgical  treatment.  Essays  may  be 
lawless,  but  text-books  must  follow  a  system. 

'The  insane  have  more  often  been  harmed  than 
helped  by  medicines,'  is  the  statement  with  which 
Clevenger  opens  this  chapter.  It  is  a  dictum 
that  would  have  aroused  opposition  in  the  days 
when  men  believed  blindly  in  the  materia  medica, 
but  today  most  doctors  will  not  only  admit  its 
validity,  but  will  extend  its  application  to  the 
sane  also.  The  modern  spirit  is  the  great  anti- 
toxin for  tradition.  No  god  at  present  sits  on 
an  uncontested  throne,  and  pedestals  that  once 
were  overcrowded  with  idols,  now  stand  unten- 
anted and  unworshipped.  Doubt  whispers  in 
the  ear  of  the  judge,  the  cleric  grows  less  sure  of 
hell,  and  physician  and  public  are  losing  their 


196       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

pharmacopeial  faith.  In  other  days,  when  a  girl 
was  married,  she  received  as  portion  of  her  dowry 
a  big  medicine-spoon,  and  if  it  was  not  filled  fre- 
quently enough  the  good  wife  imagined  she  was 
neglecting  her  duties,  but  the  bride  of  today  is 
apt  to  prefer  a  phonograph,  a  tennis-racket  or  a 
silver  cigarette-case. 

Clevenger's  remarks  on  the  bromides,  how- 
ever,— 'the  bromides  have  been  used  altogether 
too  much;  they  bring  about  deterioration  of 
blood,  health,  and  mind,' — are  at  variance  with 
the  convictions  of  his  confreres,  for  if  there  is  one 
belief  to  which  the  profession  still  clings,  it  is 
bromides  in  epilepsy — tho  even  this  conviction  is 
being  daily  assailed  by  an  increasing  minority. 

Clevenger's  Medical  Jurisprudence  is  a  good 
work  for  lawyers,  as  medical  matters  are  dis- 
cussed in  non-technical  language,  and  if  they 
learn  a  portion  of  its  contents  they  will  be  able 
to  embarrass  many  an  insanity  expert.  Thruout 
the  work  we  find  his  usual  indignant  outcry 
against  politicians. 

Five  years  later  he  issued  another  large  work, 
the  Evolution  of  Man  and  his  Mind,  published 
by  the  Evolution  Publishing  Company,  which 
was  himself.  From  this  time  on,  Clevenger 
was  his  own  publisher.     His  Evolution  of  Man 


Books  and  Essays  197 

and  his  Mind  may  be  considered  a  popularization 
of  his  more  technical  Comparative  Pliysiology 
and  Psychology.  On  account  of  its  subject-mat- 
ter it  recalls  Win  wood  Reade's  Martyrdom  of 
Man,  but  is  much  inferior  to  that  masterpiece. 
The  reader  who  is  unfamiliar  with  evolutionary 
and  liberal  literature  will  gain  a  varied  assort- 
ment of  interesting  information  by  a  perusal  of 
Clevenger's  volume,  as  it  is  a  sort  of  kaleido- 
scopic review  of  world-history  from  the  stand- 
point of  a  modernist. 

In  1905  he  published  a  small  work  which  he 
named  Therapeutics,  Materia  Medica,  and  Prac- 
tice of  Medicine.  The  subjects  are  arranged  in 
alphabetical  order,  but  without  plan,  method  or 
sequence.  It  is  a  haphazard,  heterogeneous  jum- 
ble, and  it  is  regrettable  that  it  should  have  pro- 
ceeded from  the  same  hand  which  turned  out  the 
Disadvantages  of  the  JJpnght  Position,  but  such 
accidents  seem  liable  to  occur  in  an  author's  life. 
James  Lane  Allen,  whose  Reign  of  Law  and 
Kentucky  Cardinal  rank  with  the  best  fiction  in 
American  literature,  penned  also  the  Heroine  in 
Bronze,  which  has  all  the  defects  of  the  average 
dime-novel,  and  few  of  its  virtues ;  Jack  London, 
with  his  strong  and  splendid  Call  of  the  Wild 
and  Martin  Eden,  was  guilty  of  such  inexcusable 


198       The  Don  Quivote  of  Psychiatry 

and  unmitigated  trash  as  Adventure  and  the 
Abysmal  Brute;  Edith  Wharton,  with  the  ex- 
quisite The  Reef  and  Summer  to  her  credit,  lost 
herself  in  the  mawkish  Fruit  of  the  Tree.  But 
the  so-called  Therapeutics,  31ateria  Medica,  and 
Practice  of  Medicine  is  not  entirely  devoid  of  in- 
terest, and  Clevenger's  definitions  of  medical 
sectarianism  are  worth  quoting,  because  they  re- 
veal his  detestation  of  all  varieties  of  obscur- 
antism in  the  healing  art: 

Christian  Science:  Homeopathy  without  sugar  pills. 

Eclecticism:  An  obsolescing  offshoot  from  Thomp- 
sonianism  in  which  it  was  taught  that  minerals  from  the 
ground  denoted  death  and  should  not  be  used,  but  plants 
grew  above  the  ground  and  indicated  life  and  are  alone 
fit  for  medicine,  in  ignorance  of  minerals  forming  on 
the  earth's  surface  and  of  some  plants  beneath.  Grad- 
ually many  of  the  silly  tenets  of  eclecticism  have  been 
abandoned  and  regular  respectable  medicine  is  mainly 
taught  in  its  schools,  until  eclectic  differ  from  regular 
physicians  mostly  in  name  tho  materia  medica  and  in- 
dications for  therapeusis  are  a  little  antiquated  and  il- 
logical. 

Homeopathy:  Suggestive  therapeutics,  or  faith  cure 
with  sugar  pills.  False  homeopathy  ignorantly  risks 
regular  medicines,  pretending  they  are  homeopathic, 
particularly  alkaloids  because  they  can  be  used  in 
minute  doses. 


Boohs  and  Essays  199 

Osteopathy:  Ignorant  massage. 
Physio-Medical:   Title    of   a   (jimck    system. 

Mechano-therapy,  naprapathy,  and  chiro- 
praxis  were  not  yet  flourishing  humbugs,  and 
thus  escaped  inclusion  on  the  unnecessary  roll  of 
medical  dcnoniinationalism. 

In  1909,  when  lie  was  sixty-six  years  old,  ap- 
peared his  last  book,  Fun  in  a  Doctor  s  Life,  and 
with  this  publication  Clevenger's  career  as  an 
author  may  be  said  to  end,  for  his  contributions 
were  no  longer  of  sufficient  value  to  be  accepted 
by  the  better  medical  periodicals  for  which  he 
had  formerly  written,  and  the  material  which  he 
furnished  in  his  old  age  to  low-grade  journals 
may  be  disregarded. 

Fun  in  a  Doctor  s  Life  is  an  autobiography, 
but  is  evidently  an  offhand  work,  not  intended 
to  rank  as  a  serious  production.  Events  and 
persons  of  imjjortance  are  omitted,  while  chapters 
are  devoted  to  incidents  of  trifling  significance. 
Our  readers  certainly  know  that  Clevenger  was 
pathologist  at  Dunning  ten  years  before  he  was 
medical  superintendent  at  Kankakee,  but  Dr 
Clevenger  chooses  to  relate  his  experiences  at 
Kankakee  fifty  pages  before  he  speaks  about 
Dunning.  Moreover,  the  book  is  loaded  with 
some  of  the  oldest  jokes  on  record.     In  spite  of 


200       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

these  defects.  Fun  in  a  Doctor  s  Life  makes  easy, 
entertaining  and  interesting  reading,  and  per- 
sonally we  are  indebted  to  it  for  some  data  which 
we  could  not  have  secured  elsewhere. 

Cleyenger  was  not  a  literary  craftsman;  he 
never  spent  time  in  polishing  his  phrases.  Yet 
he  was  a  ready  writer,  and  his  style,  tho  seldom 
powerful  and  never  classic,  was  often  vivacious 
and  at  times  graphic.  His  work  is  not  ill- 
natured,  but  fault-finding  is  abundant,  and  even 
his  technical  papers  are  polemical.  He  seemed 
to  believe  that  whatever  is,  is  wrong — which  is 
certainly  more  honest  than  believing  the  reverse. 
In  his  writings  he  rarely  boosted  himself,  but  on 
occasions  was  apt  to  be  a  bit  oracular — the  com- 
mon failing  of  authors.  As  an  example  of  his 
satire,  the  following  is  characteristic: 

Were  typhoid  fever  to  become  the  basis  of  damage 
suits,  say  against  aldermen,  for  having  allowed  the  city 
water  supply  to  become  polluted,  there  would  arise  a 
flock  of  experts  who  would  swear  away  the  possibility 
of  typhoid  fever  ever  having  existed,  and  they  would 
claim  that  what  hitherto  had  been  known  by  that  name 
was  really  something  else,  due  to  alcoholism,  syphilis, 
and  indiscretions  generally.  The  typhoid  bacillus 
would  be  derided,  and  it  could  be  easily  shown  that 
many  bacilli  had  been  discredited  as  causing  disease; 


Books  and  Essays  201 

and  the  poor  old  fogy  who  liad  defended  tlie  traditional 
typhoid  would  doubt  his  ability,  on  escaping  from  the 
witness-stand,  to  diagnose  tonsilltis  from  hemorrlioids. 

At  a  certain  medical  meeting,  the  ubiquitous 
William  Osler  placed  his  hand  on  Clevenger's 
shoulder,  and  smilingly  said:  'We  write  too 
much.'  In  reviewing  Clevenger^s  writings  of 
half  a  century — from  1859  to  1909 — we  agree 
that  for  a  man  who  was  actively  engaged  in  other 
pursuits,  he  published  too  much.  With  the  ex- 
ception of  his  Treatise  on  Government  Survey- 
ing^ which  does  not  concern  us,  nearly  all  his 
\^aluable  work  appeared  in  the  decade  from  1879 
to  1889,  beginning  with  Cerebral  Topography 
and  concluding  with  Spinal  Concussion,  embrac- 
ing his  thirty-sixth  to  forty-sixth  years.  The 
Mercurials  J  in  its  final  form,  appeared  in  1896, 
but  as  it  was  based  on  the  experimental  w^ork  he 
had  done  fifteen  years  previously,  and  formed  the 
inaugural  thesis  that  he  had  read  to  the  Chicago 
Biological  Society  in  1880,  it  really  belongs  to 
the  earlier  date. 

It  would  have  been  better,  instead  of  publish- 
ing some  of  his  later  works,  if  Dr  Cle^texger  had 
gathered  the  chief  papers  of  these  ten  years  into 


202        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

a  book  bearing  the  title,  Neurological  and  Bio- 
logical Essays.  Such  a  volume,  containing  the 
fruits  of  his  mental  prime,  would  occupy  an 
honored  place  in  the  library  of  American  Science. 


CHAPTER  VII 
THE  PHILADELPHIA  GROUP 

CLEVENGER'S  work  naturally  brought 
him  into  communion  with  various  scien- 
tists; with  some  of  these  his  contact  was  only 
casual,  while  with  others  he  formed  friendships, 
fostered  by  correspondence,  that  persisted  for 
years. 

A  pencilled  post-card  which  Clevenger 
mailed  to  his  wife  during  his  Philadelphia  visit 
in  1883,  gives  us  a  glimpse  of  his  intimacy  with 
several  of  the  illustrious  sons  of  the  University 
of  Pennsylvania: 

I  reached  here  yesterday  morning  quite  early  and  the 
day  was  made  a  very  pleasant  one  for  me  by  Profes- 
sors Cope,  H.  C.  Wood,  Pepper  and  Mills.  I  stay 
at  Prof.  Cope's  house,  and  went  with  him  to  the  Phila- 
delphia Academy  of  Natural  Sciences,  before  which 
venerable  body  I  lectured  last  night.  I  felt  all  the  hon- 
ors of  the  occasion.  Today  I  visit  Prof.  Leidy  and 
then  go  to  New  York. 

That  must  have  been  a  memorable  day  which 
Clevenger  spent  with  Leidy,  for  the  famous 

203 


204       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Philadelphian  was  an  intellectual  spendthrift 
who  poured  out  his  biologic  treasures  in  profu- 
sion. Leidy  was  twenty  years  older  than  Clev- 
ENGER,  and  it  seems  that  his  ancestors — who  came 
from  the  valley  of  the  Rhine — were  neither  great 
robbers  nor  favorites  of  princes,  for  the  family 
did  not  boast  of  its  heraldry,  but  worked  for  a 
living.  Joseph  Leidy's  father,  Philip  Leidy, 
kept  a  hatter's  shop  on  Third  and  Vine  Streets. 
The  hatter's  wife  died  during  Joseph's  infancy, 
and  instead  of  going  into  strange  territory,  Mr 
Leidy  promptly  married  one  of  his  wife's  rela- 
tions. For  centuries  the  stepmother  has  been 
a  symbol  of  cruelty  and  harshness,  but  Joseph 
Leidy's  stepmother  was  his  chief  benefactor. 

A  letter  written  by  a  visiting  relative  during 
Leidy's  childhood,  describes  'Joe^  sitting  on  the 
floor,  looking  at  the  sides  of  an  earthworm, 
stretched  upon  a  board.'  The  hatter's  son  was 
a  born  scientist — mysterious  are  the  ways  of 
heredity — and  in  his  young  days,  when  more  pro- 
fessional material  was  not  available,  he  employed 
barnyard  fowls  as  subjects  for  dissection.  At 
the  age  of  ten,  he  filled  a  small  book  with  draw- 
ings of  shells. 

His  stepmother  sent  him  to  the  Classical 
Academy  conducted  by  a  Methodist  clergyman, 


The  Philadelphia  Group  205 

but  the  embryo  biologist  often  absented  himself 
from  the  Latin  and  rlietorie  to  seek  speeimens. 
The  boys  of  a  rival  institution  sometimes  fought 
with  the  students  of  the  Classical  Academy,  and 
accordingly  a  colored  lad  named  Cyrus  Burris 
was  hired  to  protect  Joseph  from  'those  rowdy 
boys' — as  the  affectionate  stepmother  called  the 
other  boys.  Cyrus  Burris  performed  his  duties 
perhaps  too  faithfully,  for  not  only  did  he  escort 
his  charge  to  school,  but  he  accompanied  him 
when  Leidy  remained  away  from  school.  On 
fine  days,  while  his  classmates  were  bending  over 
their  books,  Joseph  and  his  intelligent  and  lik- 
able companion  wandered  thru  the  neighboring 
woods,  studying  nature. 

When  Leidy  was  sixteen  years  old,  it  was  time 
to  look  around  for  a  means  of  livelihood,  and  as 
he  had  a  talent  for  drawing,  his  father  thought  he 
ought  to  be  a  sign-painter.  But  Leidy  had  al- 
ready passed  several  stray  hours  in  the  whole- 
sale drug-house  of  his  cousin,  Dr  Napoleon  B. 
Leidy,  and  wanted  to  be  an  apothecary.  His 
father  consented,  and  in  due  time  Leidy  began 
to  make  money  and  might  have  remained  a  phar- 
macist for  years,  but  at  this  juncture  his  step- 
mother interfered.  She  insisted  that  the  drug- 
trade  was  not  suitable  for  Leidy",  and  urged  that 


206       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

he  prepare  himself  for  the  higher  calling  of  medi- 
cine. 

But  Leidy's  father  stubbornly  refused  to  hear 
of  another  profession,  saying  that  the  boy  was 
getting  a  good  salary  now,  and  financial  returns 
from  medicine  were  always  uncertain.  Why, 
there  was  Dr  So-and-So  who  had  been  practising 
for  ten  years,  and  didn't  have  enough  capital  to 
buy  a  decent  hat.  So  the  domestic  peace  was 
disturbed  by  wordy  warfare,  until  victory 
perched  on  the  stepmother's  banner. 

In  the  autumn  of  1840,  Leidy  became  a  pupil 
of  Dr  James  McClintock,  a  private  teacher  of 
anatomy.  The  father  proposed  to  pay  the  pre- 
ceptor's fee  in  hats,  a  bargain  which  was  ac- 
cepted. But  it  seems  the  hats  didn't  fit,  for  a 
dispute  arose,  and  Philip  Leidy  was  a  mad  hat- 
ter. The  following  year,  young  Leidy  matricu- 
lated at  the  University  of  Pennsylvania,  received 
his  M.D.  in  1844,  and  displayed  his  sign  at  211 
North  Sixth  Street.  Most  doctors  are  average 
men,  and  they  scramble  greedily  for  coin,  but  in 
every  age  there  have  been  physicians  whom  na- 
ture did  not  intend  to  be  practitioners:  in  the 
seventeenth  century,  Swammerdam  graduated 
in  medicine,  but  no  parental  threats  could  induce 
him  to  attend  a  patient;  in  the  eighteenth  cen- 


The  Philadelphia  Group  207 

tury,  Hunter  Jfiung  down  his  scalpel  with  an 
oath  when  he  was  obliged  to  leave  his  dissection 
in  order  to  earn  'that  damned  guinea,'  and  in  the 
nineteenth  century,  Haeckkl  fixed  his  office- 
hours  at  six  in  the  morning,  so  patients  would 
not  interrupt  his  investigations.  To  this  unprac- 
tical group  of  immortals,  Joseph  Leidy  belongs : 
he  was  called  to  an  obstetric  case,  but  before  he 
arrived  the  baby  was  born,  for  Dr  Leidy  forgot 
all  about  the  coming  event  while  engrossed  over 
the  anatomy  of  a  worm. 

One  morning,  during  his  twenty-third  year, 
Leidy  sat  down  to  a  breakfast  that  was  to  make 
his  name  a  landmark  in  the  history  of  parasitol- 
ogy. For  in  a  slice  of  ham  that  was  served  to 
him,  he  noticed  numerous  white  specks.  Instead 
of  grumbling  at  the  cook,  he  placed  these  specks 
under  his  microscope,  and  they  proved  to  be  the 
cysts  of  the  trichina  spiralis,  which  Richard 
Owen  had  observed  in  the  human  muscle. 
Leidy^s  interrupted  breakfast  prepared  the  way 
for  Leuckart's  revelation  that  trichinosis  in 
man  is  due  to  eating  infected  pork.  Science  is 
international,  and  the  first  step  in  this  triple  dis- 
covery was  made  hj  an  Englishman,  the  second 
by  an  American,  and  the  third  by  a  German. 

At  the  age  of  twenty-four,  Leidy  proved  tliat 


208       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

the  fossil  horse  of  America,  tho  extinct  at  the 
time  of  Columbus,  had  existed  in  this  country 
in  prehistoric  eras.  As  his  doctor's  sign  was  still 
in  his  window  when  he  accomplished  this  feat,  it 
is  obvious  that  he  was  not  too  busy  with  patients. 

The  following  year,  William  E.  Horner,  the 
frail  but  brilliant  professor  of  anatomy  at  the 
University  of  Pennsylvania,  was  advised  to  un^ 
dertake  a  European  trip  for  his  health,  and  he 
asked  Leidy,  who  was  already  his  prosector,  to 
be  his  companion — and  no  coaxing  was  required 
to  induce  this  doctor  to  abandon  his  practice. 

Two  years  later,  in  1850,  George  B.  Wood, 
the  eminent  professor  of  materia  medica,  ar- 
ranged to  visit  Europe  to  collect  models,  casts, 
and  preparations,  and  again  the  lovable  Leidy 
was  invited  to  go.  During  these  excursions, 
Leidy  met  the  leaders  of  European  science: 
Magendie  and  Milne-Edwards  in  France, 
Owen  and  Darwin  in  England,  and  Johannes 
MtJLLER  in  Germany.  Altho  still  in  his  twen- 
ties, Leidy  had  a  scientist's  reputation,  and  whenj 
the  modest  youth,  upon  the  repeated  solicitation 
of  Professor  Wood,  sent  in  his  card  to  Muller, 
the  great  physiologist  came  out  crying,  'Which 
is  Leidy?' 

In  1851  Leidy  composed  a  work  on  Flora  and 


The  Philadelphia  Group  209 

Fauna  Within  hiving  Animals,  in  which  he  es- 
tablished that  the  alimentary  canal  is  the  natural 
home  of  a  most  diversified  animal  and  vegetable 
life.  Leidy  dealt  with  facts,  and  rarely  in- 
dulged in  speculations,  but  in  this  treatise  there 
occurs  the  following  exception: 

The  study  of  the  earth's  crust  teaches  us  that  very 
many  species  of  plants  and  animals  became  extinct  at 
successive  periods,  while  other  races  originated  to  oc- 
cupy their  places.  Tliis  probably  was  the  result,  in 
many  cases,  of  a  change  in  exterior  conditions  incom- 
patible with  the  life  of  certain  species  and  favorable 
to  the  primitive  production  of  others.  .  .  .  There  ap- 
pear to  be  but  trifling  steps  from  the  oscillating  par- 
ticle of  inorganic  matter  to  a  bacterium;  from  this  to 
a  vibrio,  thence  to  a  monas,  and  so  gradually  up  to  the 
highest  orders  of  life.   .   .   . 

So  here  we  have  a  remarkable  passage,  written, 
by  a  youth  of  twenty-eight,  several  years  before 
the  publication  of  Origin  of  Species,  briefly  but 
clearly  foreshadowing  the  essentials  of  Dar- 
winism. 

In  1852,  Leidy  was  all  agog  at  the  prospect 
of  accompanying  an  expedition  to  the  West  to 
collect  fossils,  but  at  the  last  moment  he  was 
obliged  to  remain  home.     For  the  discoverer  of 


210        The  Don  Qiiirote  of  Psychiatry 

Horner's  muscle  no  longer  had  strength  to  lec- 
ture, and  Leidy  delivered  the  course.  The  fol- 
lowing year  Horner's  illness  passed  into  death^ 
and  such  men  as  Joseph  Henry  and  Jeffries 
Wyman  worked  for  Leidy's  election  to  the  va- 
cant chair.  Spencer  Fullerton  Baird,  who 
for  many  years  was  a  sort  of  superintendent  of 
American  science,  wrote  to  Leidy:  'Do  not  leave 
Philadelphia  until  you  have  settled  the  profes- 
sorship. Do  not  worry  about  the  fossil  bones. 
They  will  be  sent  to  you  anyhow' — which  was 
true,  as  Leidy  was  then  the  most  active  paleon- 
tologist in  America.  But  antagonists  arose  who 
accused  Leidy  of  making  proselytes  to  infidelity, 
and  it  was  asserted  that  'he  tried  to  prove  that 
geology  overthrows  the  Mosaic  account  of  crea- 
tion'— which  it  certainly  does.  Was  there  ever 
an  honest  scientist  who  has  not  been  accused  of 
attempting  to  subvert  the  Jewish  account  of 
creation? 

Merit  is  sometimes  rewarded,  for  Leidy  ob- 
tained the  professorship.  Thus  at  the  age  of 
thirty  he  became  the  successor  to  such  historic 
figures  in  American  anatomy  as  William 
Shippen,  Jr,  Caspar  Wistar,  John  Syng 
DoRSEY,  Philip  Syng  Physick,  and  William 
E.  Horner.     Moderate  as  was  the  salary,  Leidy 


The  Philadelphia  Group  211 

was  delighted  at  the  prospect  of  a  definite  income, 
for  it  liberated  liiin  from  the  necessity  of  continu- 
ing an  intolerable  practice.  But  the  hatter 
shook  his  head,  and  simply  said  that  'a  first-class 
sign  painter  had  been  spoiled  to  make  a  j^oor 
doctor.' 

For  the  rest  of  his  life,  Leidy  taught  anatomy 
for  a  living,  and  became  the  leader  of  American 
anatomists,  but  his  heart  was  in  natural  history. 
Altho  educated  as  a  physician,  he  lectured  to 
hosts  of  medical  students  on  anatomy  without 
ever  referring  to  its  application  in  medicine.  In 
the  year  in  which  he  entered  upon  his  professor- 
ship, 1853,  he  published,  not  a  treatise  on  my- 
ology, but  that  paleontological  classic,  the 
Ancient  Fauna  of  Nebraska.  He  described  the 
attic  of  the  middle  ear,  and  proved  the  existence 
of  the  intermaxillary  bone  in  the  human  embryo, 
thus  confirming  the  prophecy  of  Goethe,  but 
Leidy's  discoveries  in  hmiian  anatomy  were  not 
significant.  His  Elementary  Treatise  on  Hu- 
7nan  Anatomy,  illustrated  by  himself,  anglicised 
the  terms  in  the  text,  relegating  the  Latin  equiva- 
lents to  foot-notes,  under  the  belief  that  this 
method  would  render  the  subject  easier  for  stu- 
dents— but  the  innovation  did  not  popularize  the 
English  tongue,  and  when  Gray  appeared  with 


212       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

the  names  printed  directly  upon  the  structures, 
it  became  the  Gibraltar  of  text-books.  Leidy 
was  now  a  scientist  of  wide  renown,  but  it  is 
eminently  characteristic  of  the  man  that  one  of 
the  first  copies  of  his  book  was  inscribed  'To 
Cyrus  Burris^  from  his  old  friend,  the  author.' 

In  1854,  the  Ray  Society  published  the  last  of 
Darwin's  four  Monographs  on  the  Cirripedes^ 
and  the  greatest  of  biologists  refers  to  Leidy's 
discoveries,  saying,  'owing  to  Prof.  Leidy's  dis- 
covery of  eyes  in  a  Balanus,  I  was  led  to  look 
for  them  in  the  Lepadida.' 

The  year  1859  was  of  importance  to  Leidy, 
for  upon  the  appearance  of  Darwin's  Origin  of 
Species,  he  said  he  felt  'as  tho  I  had  hitherto 
gi'oped  almost  in  the  darkness  and  all  of  a  sudden 
a  meteor  flashed  upon  the  skies.'  Asa  Gray  and 
Joseph  Leidy  were  the  first  scientists  who  wel- 
comed the  theory  of  evolution  to  America,  and 
in  answering  Leidy,  Darwin  wrote  with  his 
usual  modesty — and  parentheses : 

Most  paleontologists  (with  some  few  exceptions)  en- 
tirely despise  my  work ;  consequently  approbation  from 
you  has  gratified  me  much.  All  the  older  geologists 
(with  the  one  exception  of  Lyell,  whom  I  look  at  as 
a  host  in  himself)  are  even  more  vehement  against  the 


JOSEPH  LEIDY 


The  Philadelphia  Group  213 

modification  of  species  than  are  even  the  paleontolo- 
gists. .  .  .  Your  sentence,  that  you  have  some  inter- 
esting facts  in  support  of  the  doctrine  of  selection,  has 
deliglitcd  mc  even  inoro  than  fhc  rest  of  your  note. 

At  the  age  of  forty,  liEiDY  relinquished  his 
bachelordom  to  become  the  husband  of  Anna 
Harden.  As  they  had  no  children  of  their  own, 
they  adopted  the  daughter  of  a  deceased  pro- 
fessor, and  little  Alwina  Franks  brought  them 
much  happiness.  Nature  is  an  incorrigible 
blunderer:  imbeciles  are  notoriously  fertile,  but 
Joseph  Leidy,  one  of  the  noblest  of  men,  was 
sterile.  Leidy  was  not  a  Christian,  but  did  not 
marry  in  order  to  have  religion  in  his  wife's  name, 
for  when  interrogated  on  theology,  he  responded 
that  his  views  were  ably  expressed  in  John 
Fiske's  Cosmic  Philosophy. 

For  many  years  Leidy's  discoveries  were  so 
numerous  that  no  one  remembers  them  all.  He 
knew  little,  and  cared  little,  for  general  litera- 
ture, and  poetry  to  him  was  only  'rhyming  stuff' 
and  a  'roundabout  way  of  expressing  ideas,'  but 
as  a  zoologist  he  knew  everything  from  a  proto- 
zoan to  man.  From  the  sedmient  which  he 
squeezed  from  a  piece  of  moss,  he  found  thirty- 
eight  kinds  of  rhizopods.     A  muddy  di'op  of 


214       The  Don  Quirote  of  Psychiatry 

water  in  a  neighboring  ditch  would  yield  a  dis- 
covery to  Leidy.  His  monumental  Fresh 
Water  Rhizopods  of  North  America  was  created 
with  a  microscope  that  cost  fifty  dollars.  With 
equal  facility  he  could  describe  a  new-born  bark- 
louse  that  crawled  on  a  tree,  or  a  huge  mastodon 
that  had  lain  for  centuries  dead.  His  researches 
on  the  comparative  anatomy  of  the  liver  are  val- 
uable, and  he  was  the  first  who  experimented  in 
the  transplantation  of  malignant  tumors ;  his  dif- 
ferentiation of  the  parasitic  amebse,  his  belief 
that  flies  are  the  transmitters  of  disease,  his  loca- 
tion of  a  hookworm  in  a  sick  cat  and  suggestion 
that  it  might  be  responsible  for  pathological  con- 
ditions in  the  human  race,  are  almost  lost  in  a 
mass  of  other  discoveries  in  zoology,  helminthol- 
ogy,  and  paleontology. 

When  Leidy  became  the  founder  of  vertebrate 
paleontology  in  America,  Marsh  was  a  lad  and 
Cope  an  infant,  and  for  a  long  time  Leidy  car- 
ried the  science  on  his  shoulders.  His  Creta- 
ceous Reptiles  of  the  United  States,  and  Contri- 
butions to  the  Extinct  Vertebrate  Fauna  of  the 
Western  Territories  are  imperishable  master- 
pieces, and  his  monograph  of  1869,  On  the  Ex- 
tinct Mammalia  of  Dakota  and  Nebraska,  is  pro- 
nounced by  OsBORN  the  most  important  paleon- 


The  Philadelphia  Gnmp  215 

tological  work  vvliich  America  has  produced,  with 
the  possible  exception  of  Cope's  Tertiary  Verte- 
hrata.  Yet  with  the  exception  of  his  text-book 
on  anatomy  and  his  reports  to  the  Surgeon-Gen- 
eral, Leidy's  writings  brought  him  no  pecuniary 
reward.  Ever  since  money  was  invented,  most 
of  it  has  been  in  the  wrong  hands.  Debauchers 
of  our  literature,  our  McCutcheons,  Mc- 
Graths  and  Dixons,  make  more  from  a  best- 
seller Avhich  is  forgotten  within  a  twelvemonth 
of  publication,  than  Leidy  earned  from  hundreds 
of  pamphlets  and  volumes  which  advanced  the 
boundary-lines  of  human  knowledge.  On  sev- 
eral occasions,  Leidy  attempted  to  augment  his 
meagre  income,  but  with  results  that  ultimately 
led  him  to  desist.  Fortunes  were  made  in  petro- 
leum ;  Leidy  speculated  in  it,  until  he  found  him- 
self minus  four  thousand  dollars.  He  invested 
in  a  silver  mine,  and  lost  eight  thousand  dollars. 
He  purchased  stock  in  a  railroad,  which  from 
that  day  ceased  paying  dividends. 

Clevenger  has  told  the  writer  of  Leidy's  ap- 
proachableness  and  unaffected  humility,  and  all 
who  knew  him  testify  that  rarely  has  so  great  a 
man  been  so  simple.  At  a  time  when  the  name 
of  Joseph  Leidy  was  honored  by  every  scientist 


216       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

in  America  and  Europe,  he  would  go,  at  six  in 
the  morning,  to  the  large  jfish-market  on  Twelfth 
Street,  sit  behind  the  stalls,  talking  and  laughing 
with  the  men,  watching  them  as  they  cleaned  the 
fish  to  see  if  there  was  anything  of  interest  to 
him.  Passers-by  who  noticed  this  broad-chested, 
strong-limbed  man  of  two  hundred  pounds,  with 
his  full  beard,  flowing  hair  and  pensive  eyes, 
must  have  taken  him  for  a  super-fisherman. 

Leidy  loved  peace,  and  never  made  an  enemy. 
So  averse  was  he  to  belligerency,  that  some  one 
remarked,  'Leidy  is  an  invertebrate.'  His  good- 
ness, gentleness,  helpfulness,  were  proverbial, 
and  he  was  regarded  as  the  prototype  of  the 
faultless  man.  Perhaps  the  bitterest  words  that 
Leidy  ever  uttered,  were  spoken  in  the  winter  of 
his  life,  to  the  distinguished  Scottish  geologist. 
Sir  Archibald  Geikie: 

Formerly  every  fossil  bone  found  in  the  States  came 
to  me,  for  nobody  else  cared  to  study  such  things.  But 
now  Professors  Marsh  and  Cope,  with  long  purses, 
offer  money  for  what  used  to  come  to  me  for  nothing, 
and  in  that  respect  I  cannot  compete  with  them.  So 
now,  as  I  get  nothing,  I  have  gone  back  to  my  micro- 
scope and  my  rhizopods  and  make  myself  busy  and 
happy  with  them. 


The  Philadelphia  Group  217 

Leidy  received  various  foreign  honors,  such 
as  the  Lyell  Medal  from  England  and  the  Cuvier 
Medal  from  France,  and  was  president  of  sev- 
eral scientific  associations  in  America.  He 
served  as  first  president  of  the  Association  of 
American  Anatomists,  and  was  succeeded  by  one 
of  his  pupils  who  resembled  him  in  many  respects 
— Harrison  Allen. 

The  ancestors  of  Allen  arrived  in  Philadel- 
phia with  William  Penn,  but  evidently  did  not 
accumulate  wealth  for  their  descendants,  as 
Harrison  Allen  was  obliged  to  leave  high- 
school  because  he  lacked  funds.  Already  he  was 
eager  for  natural  history,  but  the  need  of  wages 
drove  him  into  a  hardware  store ;  next  he  worked 
on  a  farm,  and  the  nearest  he  could  get  to  science 
was  by  entering  the  dental  ofRce  of  Dr  J.  Foster 
Flagg.  During  his  leisure  he  read  medical 
books,  took  courses  in  the  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania, where  he  came  under  the  influence  of 
Leidy,  and  in  his  twentieth  year  received  his 
M.D.,  just  as  the  Civil  War  was  beginning. 

At  first  he  was  resident  physician  in  the  Block- 
ley  Hospital  of  Philadelphia,  but  during  the 
greater  part  of  the  conflict  was  assigned  to  hos- 
pitals in  Washingi;on.  As  there  are  more  than 
140  references  to  him  in  the  Medical  and  Surgical 


218        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

History  of  the  War  of  the  BehclUon,  he  must 
have  been  kept  busy,  but  every  precious  moment 
that  he  could  spare  was  spent  in  the  Smithsonian 
Institution — and  here  he  worked  under  those 
makers  of  American  science,  Spencer  F.  Baird 
and  Joseph  Henry. 

Allen's  earHest  publication  was  a  Descrip- 
tion of  New  Pteroinne  Bats  of  North  Africa, 
which  had  been  brought  over  by  the  explorer 
Du  Chaillu.  Allen  never  deserted  these 
aerial  mammals,  and  wrote  over  thirty  essays  on 
bats,  including  the  classic  Monograph  on  the 
Bats  of  North  America,  which  was  published  by 
the  Smithsonian  Institution.  In  honor  of  his 
high-school  teacher,  Dr  Henry  McMurtrie, 
Allen  named  the  Mexican  bat,  Centurio 
McMurtrii — this  being  the  highest  honor  that 
Allen  could  bestow. 

But  Allen's  scientific  interests  were  not  lim- 
ited to  bats,  as  is  evident  from  his  Crania  from 
Florida  Mounds  and  Hawaiian  Skulls — both  of 
them  important  contributions  to  craniology.  It 
was  Harrison  Allen  who  dissected  and  de- 
scribed that  unforgettable  freak  of  nature — the 
Siamese  twins.  Among  his  other  writings  are 
the  Origin  and  History  of  Art-Designs,  tracing 
them  to  anatomical  archetypes,  Localization  of 


The  Philadelphia  Group  219 

Diseased  Action  in  the  Osseous  System,  On  the 
Uhinoscope  and  Diseases  of  the  Pharynx,  On 
Pathological  Anatomy  of  Osteom,yelitis,  and  The 
Jaw  of  Moulin-Quignon.  His  text-book,  Out- 
lines of  Comparative  Anatomy  and  Medical 
Zoology,  wjis  followed  in  later  years  by  a  System 
of  Human  Anatomy — the  result  of  long  and 
faithful  travail,  and  bringing  him  fame,  but  leav- 
ing his  pocket  empty. 

In  his  twenty-fourth  year  Allen  was  ap- 
pointed professor  in  the  University  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, and  for  thirty  years  he  taught  in  this  in- 
stitution, tho  he  shifted  somewhat  from  chair  to 
chair.  He  was  devoid  of  aggi'essiveness,  but 
rose  to  a  leading  position  in  American  anatomy 
and  rhino-laryngology.  His  researches  were  not 
of  Leidyian  scope,  but  he  resembled  Leidy  in 
character:  pure-hearted  and  humble,  earnest  and 
unpretentious,  he  labored  for  science  and  loved 
his  fellow-men.  From  the  lips  of  Haerison 
Allen  never  fell  an  unkind  word — even  about 
bores.  This  unusual  forbearance  on  Allen's 
part  is  vouched  for  by  so  careful  an  observer  as 
Burt  G.  Wilder,  w^ho  further  claims  that  if  the 
devil  had  been  objurgated  in  his  presence,  Aj:.len 
would  have  answered:  'His  satanic  majesty  has 
doubtless  many  sins  to  answer  for,  but  let  us  not 


220       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

forget  his  extraordinary  ability,  activity,  and 
enterprise.' 

Wilder,  who  was  closely  attached  to  Allen, 
points  out  that  the  climax  of  Allen's  useful  and 
honorable  career  was  reached  in  1891,  for  in  that 
year  he  became  professor,  for  the  second  time,  of 
comparative  anatomy  and  zoology  at  the  Univer- 
sity of  Pennsylvania,  president  of  the  Contem- 
porary Club  of  Philadelphia,  curator  of  the 
Wistar  Institute  of  Anatomy,  president  of  the 
Anthropometric  Society,  president  of  the  Asso- 
ciation of  American  Anatomists,  succeeding 
Joseph  Leidy,  and  published  a  dozen  papers. 

Clevenger's  acquaintance  with  Allen  began 
at  the  outset  of  the  former's  professional  career, 
when  he  sent  Professor  Allen  some  reprints 
which  were  acknowledged  in  a  courteous  note : 

I  have  received  your  papers,  which  you  were  kind 
enough  to  send  me,  on  the  Sulcus  Rolando,  the  Topog- 
raphy of  the  CerebruTn,  and  the  Action  of  Mercury.  I 
have  read  these  with  great  interest.  I  would  esteem  it 
a  great  favor  if  you  would  send  me  your  papers  that 
you  may  hereafter  publish.     I  will  heartily  reciprocate. 

Clevenger  then  told  Allen  of  the  School  of 
Biology  he  was  founding,  and  Allen,  who  seems 
to  have  been  moved  easily  to  enthusiasm,  cried. 


The  Philadelphia  Group  221 

'All  hail  to  Chicago  1  I  wish  we  had  more  of 
her  spirit  here.'  But  when  the  Clevengerian 
School  of  Biology  failed  to  materialize,  and  in- 
stead, the  Dunning  Asylum  sent  its  stench  over 
the  land,  Allen  became  reconciled  to  the  town 
that  his  ancestors  chose,  and  wrote  to  Clev- 
enger:  'Truly  you  have  an  extraordinary  state 
of  affairs  in  Chicago.  If  we  have  any  feelings  of 
discontent  here,  how  quickly  they  should  disap- 
pear when  the  Philadelphia  status  is  compared 
with  the  Chicagoan.' 

In  Allen's  letter  to  Clevenger,  of  April, 
1884,  occurs  an  epigrammatic  paragraph  which 
might  provoke  considerable  comment,  in  defence 
and  in  rebuttal : 

The  connexion  between  biology  and  clinical  medicine 
is  a  line  I  am  fond  of  examining.  A  hospital  is  to  me 
a  cabinet  and  each  patient  a  specimen.  I  study  medi- 
cine by  the  methods  I  learned  in  studying  natural 
history — and  I  believe  it  is  the  correct  method. 

Two  typewritten  letters  which  Allen,  as 
chairman  of  the  executive  committee,  sent  to 
Clevenger,  are  worth  reproducing,  as  they  af- 
ford us  glimpses  into  the  infancj^  of  the  now 
important  Association  of  American  Anatomists. 
The  first  is  dated,  December,  1889: 


222       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

In  September,  1888,  at  the  time  of  the  meeting  of 
the  American  Congress  of  Physicians  in  Washington,  an 
Association  of  American  Anatomists  was  organized. 
As  Chairman  of  the  Executive  Committee  of  this  As- 
sociation I  extend  to  you  a  cordial  invitation  to  be 
present  at  the  next  annual  meeting  in  this  city. 

It  is  proposed  to  meet  in  the  biological  department 
of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania,  December  26th, 
27th,  and  28th.  Prof.  Joseph  Leidy  will  be  in  the 
Chair.  Papers  will  be  read  by  a  number  of  distin- 
guished anatomists. 

You  are  cordially  invited  to  attend  these  meetings  as 
a  guest  of  the  Association,  and  to  read  a  volunteer 
paper  or  exhibit  specimens. 

The  second  of  these  communications  is  dated 
January,  1890: 

At  a  stated  meeting  of  the  Executive  Committee 
of  the  Association  of  American  Anatomists  held  De- 
cember 2Tth,  1889,  you  were  invited  to  become  one  of 
the  original  members  of  the  Association.  If  you  de- 
sire to  accept  this  invitation  will  you  kindly  send  me 
word  to  that  effect.^  It  is  due  to  you  to  state  that 
the  call  for  the  first  meeting  of  the  Association  was  is- 
sued by  Dr  A.  H.  P.  Leuf,  who  was  imperfectly  in- 
formed regarding  the  personnel  of  the  working  anato- 
mists of  the  country.  The  Executive  Committee  is 
doing  all  that  lies  in  its  power  to  correct  the  errors 


The  Philadelphia  Group  223 

whicli  wore  inseparable  from  the  first  plan  of  or^rani- 
zation,  and  earnestly  request  that  you  will  join  with 
them  in  directing  a  movement  which  it  is  believed  will 
be  of  great  sei'vice  in  the  cultivation  of  anatomical  sci- 
ence in  America. 

It  is  proposed  to  hold  an  annual  meeting  of  the  As- 
sociation. Every  third  year  this  meeting  will  be  held 
in  Washington.  All  other  times  it  will  meet  at  time 
and  place  with  the  American  Association  of  Natural- 
ists. 

I  herewith  enclose  a  program  which  may  interest  you. 

Clevenger's  stock  of  information  was  sur- 
prisingly heterogeneous,  and  Harrison  Allen's 
last  letter  to  Clevenger — at  least,  the  last  that 
has  been  preserved — contains  an  interesting  tech- 
nical query,  but  whether  Clevenger  evolved  the 
terms  himself  or  found  them  in  the  pages  of 
Owen,  we  do  not  know.  The  letter  is  dated 
December,  1894: 

I  am  greatly  interested  in  the  pamphlet  on  Miso- 
phobia which  you  were  kind  enough  to  send  me  a  short 
time  ago.  In  it  you  allude  to  the  'ulnar  fingers,  radial 
fingers,  etc'  I  have  been  giving  some  attention  of  late 
to  the  hand  and  have  always  been  of  the  opinion  that 
the  manus  of  all  mammals  is  divided  into  an  ulnar  and  a 
radial  set  of  fingers  (toes).  I  did  not  know  that  any- 
one else  had  called  attention  to  it.     If  not  too  much 


224       The  Don  Quiccote  of  Psychiatry 

trouble,  will  you  kindly  tell  me  what  induced  you  to 
use  these  terms  and  where  I  can  find  the  original  de- 
scription of  such  classification? 

Of  all  the  societies  which  Harrison  Allen 
graced  by  his  membership,  he  was  most  inti- 
mately connected  with  the  Academy  of  Natural 
Sciences  of  Philadelphia,  sending  to  it  his  first 
essay  on  bats  for  publication  in  its  proceedings, 
and  the  following  year  joining  it  at  the  instiga- 
tion of  Edward  Drinker  Cope,  who  was 
Allen's  senior  by  only  nine  months,  but  already 
an  active  worker  in  science.  Cope,  like  Allen, 
came  of  old  Philadelphia  stock:  his  great-grand- 
father, Caleb  Cope,  was  the  sturdy  Quaker  who 
defended  Major  Andre  from  mob  violence;  his 
grandfather,  Thomas  Pim  Cope,  founded  the 
house  of  Cope  Brothers,  celebrated  in  the  early 
mercantile  annals  of  Philadelphia;  his  father, 
Alfred,  a  man  of  wealth  and  intellect,  deter- 
mined to  give  him  an  excellent  education,  tho  he 
must  have  known  that  the  sons  of  rich  men  are 
often  incapable  of  education. 

But  Mr  Cope  had  no  trouble  with  Edward, 
who  literally  absorbed  knowledge  from  his  cra- 
dle-days. When  seven  years  of  age,  Edward 
was  taken  by  his  father  on  a  trip  to  Boston  by 


The  Philadelphia  Group  225 

water,  and  on  the  way  the  boy  kept  a  journal  in 
which  he  discussed  and  illustrated  the  creatures 
he  observed  in  the  sea.  At  nine,  his  drawing  and 
description  of  a  caterpillar  revealed  the  develop- 
ing naturalist. 

Ten  years  later,  Cope  was  a  full-fledged  scien- 
tist, studying  reptiles  at  the  Smithsonian  Institu- 
tion, under  Spencer  F.  Baird.  Within  a  few 
months  he  returned  to  Philadelphia,  and  worked 
in  the  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences,  cataloging 
the  serpents  and  describing  new  species.  In  the 
autumn  of  1859,  when  a  small  green-covered 
volume  revolutionized  biology.  Cope  was  still  in 
his  teens,  but  the  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences 
of  Philadelphia  was  already  publishing  his  first 
scientific  paper.  On  the  primary  division  of  the 
SalamandridcB,  with  a  description  of  two  new 
species.  Writing  to  his  cousin  at  this  time, 
young  Cope  referred  to  his  maiden  essay,  and 
then  casually  remarked :  'Nobody  in  this  country 
knows  anything  about  Salamanders,  but  Profes- 
sor Baird  and  thy  humble  coz.' 

Before  Cope  was  old  enough  to  vote,  he  was  a 
veteran  of  science.  He  modified  systems  with 
nonchalant  assurance,  and  in  an  amazing  com- 
munication published  in  his  twentieth  year,  he 
says: 


226       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

.  In  proposing  the  name  Zaocys  ...  we  are  giving 
expression  to  an  opinion  long  held  by  us  as  to  the  un- 
natural association  of  species  in  the  so-called  genus 
Coryphodon.  ...  In  it  we  find  cylindrical  terrestrial 
species,  united  with  compressed  subarboricole  species, 
upon  a  peculiarity  whose  value  as  an  index  of  nature 
appears  to  us  entirely  imaginary.  The  very  nature  of 
the  coryphodontian  type  of  dentition,  as  distinguished 
from  the  isodontian  and  syncranterian,  would  lead  us 
to  infer  its  inconstancy. 

Cope  never  studied  the  cloak  and  suit  business, 
medicine,  or  law,  as  his  financial  circumstances 
relieved  him  from  the  necessity  of  adopting  a 
paying  profession.  But  altho  deprived  of  the 
'splendid  spur  of  poverty,'  he  toiled  ceaselessly 
in  the  pursuit  of  science.  Even  when  he  inher- 
ited more  than  a  quarter  of  a  million  dollars,  he 
worked  on  with  unrelenting  energy.  At  twenty- 
one,  he  was  probably  the  foremost  herpetologist 
in  America.  It  is  not  surprising  that  at  the  age 
of  twenty-three  this  phenomenon  found  himself 
a  victim  of  overwork.  The  usual  remedy  was 
advised — a  trip  to  Europe.  He  recuperated  by 
visiting  the  museums  of  England,  France,  Hol- 
land, Austria,  Prussia — everywhere  examining 
reptiles.  He  looked  over  Joseph  Hyrtl's 
skeletons  of  fishes,  and  was  so  delighted  with  the 


The  Pliiladelpliia  Group  227 

professor's  preparations  that  he  purehascd  them. 
Cope,  however,  did  not  secure  these  specimens 
simply  to  label  them  and  encase  them  in  glass, 
but  with  this  collection  as  a  basis,  he  recast  the 
classification  of  fishes. 

Upon  his  return  to  America,  Cope,  in  his  twen- 
ty-fourth year,  was  appointed  professor  of  com- 
parative zoology  and  botany  at  Haverford  Col- 
lege. Within  three  years,  however,  ill-health 
caused  the  youthful  professor's  resignation,  and 
for  the  following  twenty-two  years  he  held  no 
chair.  But  these  years  were  filled  with  fruitful 
investigations  which  placed  Cope  in  the  front 
rank  of  paleontologists.  As  a  private  explorer, 
and  as  vertebrate  paleontologist  to  the  United 
States  Geological  and  Geographical  Survey,  he 
roamed  thru  Ohio,  Kansas,  Colorado,  Wyoming, 
New  Mexico,  Montana,  Oregon,  Texas, — 
everywhere  west  of  the  Missouri — and  dead  eons 
unrolled  their  secrets  at  his  approach,  and  extinct 
animals  lived  again.  In  the  chalky  beds  of  these 
western  states  and  territories.  Cope  did  a  giant's 
work,  and  was  equally  fertile  in  building  up  gen- 
eralizations, and  in  describing  species  new  to  sci- 
ence. INIany  of  his  bold  deductions  have  not  sur- 
vived the  test  of  time,  but  the  innimierable  gen- 
era which  he  named,  and  the  thousand  unkno^^^l 


228       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

species  which  he  brought  to  light,  will  always  add 
their  testimony  to  the  genius  and  industry  of 
Edward  Drinker  Cope. 

Like  every  scientific  worker  in  the  sixties, 
Cope  was  influenced  by  the  doctrine  of  evolu- 
tion, and  was  among  the  first  to  apply  its  prin- 
ciples in  his  classifications.  Cope,  however,  was 
rather  a  Lamarckian  than  a  pure  Darwinian, 
claiming  that  the  'survival  of  the  fittest'  does  not 
explain  the  'origin  of  the  fittest,'  and  in  seeking 
to  discover  and  demonstrate  the  laws  governing 
the  origin  of  the  fittest,  he  founded  the  Neo- 
Lamarckian  School  in  America — and  such  men 
as  Hyatt  and  Dall  went  to  this  school. 

Among  the  huge  quartos  and  octavo  volumes 
and  endless  essays  which  came  from  the  tireless 
pen  of  Cope,  may  be  mentioned  Origin  of  the 
Fittest,  Primary  Factors  of  Organic  Evolution, 
Batrachia  of  North  America,  and  Vertehrata  of 
Cretaceous  Formations  of  the  West.  The 
Royal  Geological  Society  of  Great  Britain  gave 
him  its  medal,  Heidelberg  conferred  upon  him 
an  honorary  Ph.D.,  and  when  he  accepted  the 
chair  of  geology  and  mineralogy  at  the  Univer- 
sity of  Pennsylvania,  later  including  zoology  and 
comparative  anatomy,  he  had  long  been  acknowl- 


The  Philadelphia  Group  229 

edged  as  one  of  the  greatest  men  of  science  that 
the  American  continent  had  produced. 

Unlike  Leidy  and  Harrison  Allen,  Cope 
possessed  aggressiveness,  and  he  knew  how  to 
make  and  keep  enemies.  That  unique  litterateur, 
Isaac  DTsrai^j,  wrote  an  interesting  chapter, 
On  the  Influence  of  a  Bad  Temper  in  Criticism. 
He  didn't  know  Cope  and  Marsh,  but  when 
these  two  professors  thought  of  each  other,  they 
were  certainly  influenced  by  a  bad  temper.  On 
occasion.  Cope  could  be  as  pugnacious  as  Hux- 
ley— and  between  Cope  and  Huxley  there  ex- 
isted more  coolness  than  cordiality.  Concerning 
a  fossil  which  opposed  one  of  his  deductions, 
Cope  jestingly  remarked,  'I  wish  you  would 
throw  that  bone  out  of  the  window;'  he  felt  a 
parent's  fondness  for  his  theories,  and  hesitated 
to  disown  them,  even  when  they  proved  to  be 
misbehaving.  An  authority  on  fossils  does  not 
necessarily  become  fossilized,  but  Cope  did  not 
believe  in  votes  for  women  or  negroes,  and  his 
tract  on  The  Relation  of  the  Scales  to  Govern- 
ment, was  distributed  by  that  antiquarian  soci- 
ety, the  New  York  State  Association  Opposed 
to  the  Extension  of  Suffrage  to  Women.  Cope 
was  a  man  of  exemplary  character,  and  the  his- 


230       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

tory  of  nineteenth  century  science  cannot  be  writ- 
ten without  his  name. 

For  several  years  Cope  was  editor  of  the 
'American  NaturaHst,'  a  periodical  which  experi- 
enced considerable  difficulty  with  printers'  bills, 
but  whose  monthly  arrival  was  eagerly  awaited 
by  scientific  workers.  In  its  few  advertising 
pages  could  be  seen  a  placid  and  familiar  face, 
whose  reserved  but  benignant  smile  overlooked 
this  underlined  message:  'Lydia  E.  Pinkham's 
Vegetable  Compound  is  a  positive  cure  for  all 
those  painful  complaints  and  weaknesses  so  com- 
mon to  our  best  female  population.'  Editor 
Cope  may  not  have  admired  the  enterprising  old 
lady,  but  the  publishers  needed  her  to  help  pay 
the  aforesaid  bills.  It  was  thru  the  medium  of 
this  magazine  that  Cope  and  Clevenger  became 
acquainted;  Cle^^nger's  contributions  to  the 
'American  Naturalist'  from  1881  to  1892  have 
already  been  noticed.  In  the  issue  of  January, 
1885,  Cope  wrote  a  signed  and  appreciative  re- 
view of  Clevenger's  Comparative  Physiology 
and  Psychology. 

Clevenger's  personal  letters  to  us  contain  fre- 
quent references  to  his  Philadelphia  group  of 
friends,  especially  Cope,  and  we  will  introduce 
these  reminiscences  here: 


The  Philadelphia  Group  281 

In  rattling  off  these  letters  of  transmittal  to  you  I 
feci  they  are  often  carelessly  worded,  and  show  propen- 
sity to  both  prolixity  and  repetition  of  jocularities,  and 
maybe  they  realize  Simt/ka's  warning  that  I  was  fall- 
ing into  my  anccdotagc. 

When  I  don't  have  to  use  care,  as  in  talking  to 
friends,  the  colloquial  garrulity  and  carelessness  is  a 
comfort,  and  enables  things  the  stilted  conventional 
writing  does  not.  So  please  overlook  blunders  of  all 
kinds  and  let  me  talk  as  I  used  to  do  to  my  friends  of 
old  in  scientific  ranks. 

Ed  Cope  of  Philadelphia  was  one  of  these.  He  was 
professor  of  natural  sciences  in  the  Pennsylvania  Uni- 
versity, and  was  constantly  fishing  for  chances  to  push 
me,  and  get  me  near  him.  He  had  me  appointed  pro- 
fessor of  biology  in  the  university,  but  I  foolishly  for- 
feited the  chair  by  thinking  the  salary  of  $500  a  year 
too  small,  as  I  had  a  big  family  and  could  not  see  my 
way  clear  to  go  on  that  sum.  My  famil}^  many  times 
since  then  has  lived  on  less,  when  my  rackets  with  poli- 
ticians lost  me  an  appointment,  but  we  never  know 
what  is  in  store  for  us.  Provost  Pepper  promised  to 
confer  an  A.M.  on  me,  at  Cope's  solicitation.  I  was 
mystified  by  dela3^s  by  Peppek,  until  a  friend  told  me 
it  was  the  usual  thing  to  give  $100  for  the  degree.  I 
could  not  spare  the  $100,  and  would  have  felt  cheap 
had  I  paid  anything  for  it.  Cope  also  came  within  one 
vote  of  getting  me  the  superintendency  of  the  Penn- 


232       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

sylvania  General  Hospital  for  the  Insane.  Cope  al- 
ways gave  my  articles  first  place  in  his  American 
Naturalist. 

Cope  made  three  fortunes,  and  lost  two  of  them,  when 
I  begged  him  to  go  slow  and  keep  his  beautiful  home 
comer  on  Pine  and  21st  Street,  for  his  family.  One 
of  the  twin  houses  he  had  stocked  with  geological  speci- 
mens, mainly  fossils.  He  was  a  delightful  friend  in 
every  way.  Absolutely  without  guile  or  false  pride. 
He  was  like  Leidy  in  approachableness  and  unpretend- 
ing. 

Cope  was  a  brilliant  orator,  and  once  in  the  Tech- 
nical institute  in  Boston  I  heard  him  and  Alexander 
Agassiz  debating  about  the  number  of  vertebras  in  a 
fossil,  and  the  evolutionary  question  came  up.  This 
was  in  August  1880,  and  Cope  argued  on  evolutionary 
lines,  while  Agassiz  was  a  'trimmer'  like  his  father; 
both  were  eloquent  and  held  attention,  but  the  differ- 
ence was  evident  in  Cope  being  absolutely  sincere,  and 
Agassiz  was  untruthful,  insincere  and  a  special  pleader 
for  religious  prejudice. 

Your  admiration  for  Prof.  E.  D.  Cope  touched  me 
deeply,  for  he  was  a  man  I  loved,  and  he  desired  all 
good  things  for  me.  I  ought  to  have  many  letters 
from  him  saved  up,  but  fear  that  I  may  have  destroyed 
most  of  them;  if  not,  I  shall  be  happy  to  send  them  to 
you. 


The  PhiladdpJda  Group  288 

He  was  plain,  unassuming,  and  us  I  told  you  before, 
eloquent,  full  of  his  subject,  appreciative  of  others' 
knowledge,  never  jealous,  but  even  praised  rivals  and 
those  jealous  of  him,  if  any  excellence  in  them.  Prof. 
Marsh  on  the  other  hand  was  contemptibly  vain,  prig- 
gish, snobbish  in  dress  and  manner,  always  finding  fault 
with  Cope. 

Ed  Cope  was  plain  Ed,  and  western  in  manner,  ut- 
terly without  false  pride,  no  airs  or  assumption  of  su- 
periority ever.  Tireless  worker,  he  had  the  house  three 
or  four  stories  next  his  residence  filled  from  cellar  to 
garret  with  his  findings  of  fossils, — arranged  nearly 
as  could  be  in  eras  from  lowest  to  highest.  Most  of  his 
valuable  discoveries  were  in  the  Cretaceous  of  Wyom- 
ing. It  was  there  he  found  the  eohippus  the  connection 
between  carnivores  and  herbivores,  a  little  fox-like  ani- 
mal with  ginglymoid  joints  like  those  of  the  modem 
horse,  the  5-toed.  He  had  it  mounted  in  a  plaster 
frame  and  setting,  and  explained  it  to  me  as  we  were 
dining  at  his  house  in  1882. 

I  remember  I  accused  him  of  being  involved  in  his 
previous  metaphysical  studies,  and  once  in  the  Open 
Court  we  got  into  a  very  good-humored  discussion  of 
the  soul.  He  had  some  way  of  making  spirit  originate 
matter,  while  I  was  agnostic  and  held  that  while  it 
would  be  comfortable  to  be  sure  of  this,  we  always 
landed  where  we  started  in  any  attempt  to  explain  such 
things. 


234       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

In  Philadelphia  there  was  an  harmonious  coterie 
made  up  of  Cope,  Leidy,  Powell,  Harrison  Allen, 
and  other  sincere  truth-seekers. 

My  trips  to  Pliiladelpliia  were  pleasant  ones  as  you 
may  imagine  when  university  professors  came  to  the 
Colonnade  Hotel  (where  I  stopped  always)  when  they 
read  my  arrival  in  the  next  day's  paper,  and  insisted 
on  my  coming  to  their  homes  while  in  town.  I  much 
preferred  Cope's  house  and  he  always  chuckled  when  he 
got  to  me  first.  But  I  never  went  there  till  he  came 
for  me,  as  I  did  not  want  to  force  my  welcome. 

Lots  of  fine  chaps  in  those  days.  One  was  the  fa- 
mous head  of  the  United  States  geological  surveys, 
Major  Powell.  Another  was  Harrison  Allen,  whose 
letters  I  sent  to  you.  He  was  a  wholesouled,  honest, 
hard-working  practitioner  who  loved  truth  for  its  own 
sake.  He  impressed  everyone  as  a  sincere  gentleman, 
free  from  ostentation  and  probably  over-modest.  He 
was  inventive,  and  made  able  deductions  in  biological 
studies.  Professors  Cope,  Leidy,  Powell,  and  I  were 
very  fond  of  him. 

Then  there  was  the  great  Leidy,  smiling,  handsome, 
modest ;  chuck  full  of  biologic  lore,  with  his  Rhizopods 
under  way.  Friends  asked  him  how  fishing  was  when 
he  went  to  saw-mill  dams  to  net  rhizopods.  He  pub- 
lished liis  big  engravings  of  amebas  and  their  cousins, 
thru  the  Smithsonian  Institution;  guess  it  must  have 
cost  $50,000  to  engrave  and  bind.  They  can't  be  had 
now,  but  were  $10  each  at  first. 


E.  D.  COPE 


JOSEPH  LeCONTE 


The  PhiladclpJiia  Group  235 

Leidy  presided  at  the  meeting  of  the  Philadelphia 
Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  when  I  made  my  speech 
about  distribution  of  valves  in  the  veins.  I  spoke  20 
minutes,  and  Cope  followed  me  in  a  grand  compli- 
mentary address  of  an  hour  and  a  half,  beginning: 
'Here  is  an  instance  of  the  evolutionary  doctrine  mak- 
ing simple  what  was  a  baffling  puzzle  to  anatomists  and 
physiologists.'  He  elaborated  the  matter  in  connection 
with  his  own  work,  and  finally  announced  that  I  would 
have  an  article  on  this  subject  in  the  January  Amer- 
ican Naturalist,  entitled  Disadvantages  of  the  Upright 
Position. 

Cope's  correspondence  with  Clevenger — like 
Harrison  Aelen's — began  in  October,  1880. 
That  modern  convenience,  the  secretary-stenog- 
rapher, had  not  yet  been  evolved  into  indispensa- 
bility,  and  Cope's  letters,  whether  brief  or 
lengthy,  are  in  his  own  handwriting: 

Yours  with  the  MS.  and  the  blocks  are  received. 
The  paper  cannot  be  used  before  the  January  or  Feb- 
ruary number,  on  account  of  the  number  of  articles 
on  hand ;  we  will  insert  as  soon  as  possible.  The  pub- 
lishers say  they  will  pay  the  $6.00  if  you  will  let  them 
take  a  set  of  electro  copies,  as  they  must  have  them  in 
case  of  reprint.  How  does  this  strike  you?  I  am 
getting  somewhat  shy  of  asking  them  to  increase  their 
free-list,  which  is  pretty  long  now,  but  if  you  can  get 


236       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

us  a  subscriber  somewhere  among  your  acquaintances, 
I  will  do  it  with  an  easier  conscience  (will  do  it  any- 
how). 

Scientists  do  not  have  to  teach  anything  sub  rosa  un- 
less, unfortunately,  their  bread  and  butter  depends 
on  it.  The  time  is  however  not  far  distant  when  bread 
and  butter  can  be  had  without  anyone's  sacrificing  his 
convictions  or  even  suppressing  them.  Anyone  who  con- 
tributes to  this  state  of  things  is  a  public  benefactor. 
Evolution,  well  and  clearly  taught,  will  put  an  end  to 
ultra-sectarianism  and  classic  absurdities  more  prompt- 
ly than  anything  else.  People  will  take  facts  in  pref- 
erence to  fancies  when  they  can  only  see  them,  and  it 
is  our  privilege  and  pleasure  to  try  and  make  them  see. 
There  are  various  fields  in  which  this  can  be  done,  em- 
bryology, physiology  and  paleontology  being  the  fields 
of  ultimate  demonstration;  to  all  of  which  anatomy  is 
the  front  door,  so  to  speak. 

In  Cope's  second  letter  to  Clevenger,  dated 
November,  1880,  we  are  treated  to  the  spectacle 
of  two  learned  philosophers  discussing  a  'finan- 
cial proposition,'  involving  the  sum  of  six  dol- 
lars: 

Yours  received.  I  do  not  exactly  understand  your 
financial  proposition,  as  its  various  points  do  not  ap- 
pear to  be  entirely  consistent.  You  wish  to  pay  your 
subscription  to  the  Naturalist  ($4.  per  annum),  but 


The  Philadelphia  Group  287 

you  wish  also  to  be  credited  with  $6.00  (18  months 
subscription  American  Naturalist).  Now  tliat  means 
that  you  will  take  a  year  or  18  months  of  the  Nat- 
uralist for  use  of  the  cuts,  does  it  not?  Explain  so 
that  I  may  know  what  to  say  to  publishers. 

Your  account  of  the  Marsh  affair  sounds  very  fa- 
miliar. M.  is  a  very  peculiar  man.  I  constantly  have 
offers  from  his  men  to  employ  with  me.  Scott,  of  the 
Princeton  exploring  party,  has  just  returned  from  S 
years  in  Heidelberg,  tells  queer  stories  of  M.  and 
doesn't  like  him  any  better  than  I  do. 

Cope,  in  his  communication  to  Clevenger  of 
May,  1881,  asserts  his  priority  over  Filhol,  and 
alludes  to  his  altercation  with  Huxley  : 

Your  card  is  received.  The  points  made  by  Filhol 
were  made  by  myself  mostly ,7  to  3  years  ago,  in  Govern- 
ment Publications.  Some  years  ago,  I  had  a  slight  skir- 
mish with  Professor  Huxley  and  since  then  he  has  tried 
the  ignoring  and  silencing  process  on  me  with  some  ef- 
fect. It  depends  on  American  Naturalists  whether  this 
shall  be  effective  or  not.     See  April  Naturalist,  p.  340. 

I  send  you  two  papers  which  contain  some  of  the 
points  I  have  made — most  of  them  more  striking  than 
Filhol's. 

N.  B.  I  find  I  am  out  of  extras  of  the  papers  in 
question ;  so  I  refer  you  to  the  places  which  you  can 
easily   find.     Annual  Report  of  the  U.   S.   Geological 


238       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Sui-vey,  F.  V.  Hayden,  1872,  p.  644  to  bottom  of 
647 ;  especially  p.  645.  Final  Report,  G,  M.  Wheeler, 
vol.  IV,  pt.  II  (Paleontology  of  New  Mexico)  from  p. 
273  to  p.  282  where  the  subject  is  still  more  fully  set 
forth  (1877).  Filhol's  publications  are  all  later, 
and  are  less  conclusive.  They  are  also  mainly  tech- 
nical, so  the  reader  has  to  draw  his  own  conclusions. 

In  the  early  months  of  1884,  Cope  sent  the  fol- 
lowing note  to  Clevenger  : 

The  directorship  of  the  Pennsylvania  Hospital  for 
the  Insane,  lately  vacated  by  the  death  of  Dr  Kirk- 
bride,  is  vacant.  How  would  you  like  to  apply  for 
\i?  Your  Pennsylvania  birth  might  help  you.  Apply 
to  the  board  of  managers  of  the  Pennsylvania  Hospital 
for  the  Insane,  West  Pennsylvania,  if  you  wish  to  get 
the  place. 

Cope's  reference  to  Clevenger's  'Pennsyl- 
vania birth,'  was  merely  a  geographical  error,  for 
surely  he  was  not  so  provincial  as  to  imagine  that 
all  good  men  must  be  born  in  Philadelphia. 
Cope  busied  himself  in  Clevenger's  behalf,  but 
Clevenger  had  the  luck  of  those  men  who  lose 
by  one  vote.  In  the  spring  of  1893,  however, 
Cope  was  able  to  send  Clevenger  a  card  of  con- 
gratulations concerning  the  Kankakee  superin- 
tendency — but  he  did  not  forget  he  was  an  ed- 


The  American  Naturalist. 

A  Popular  Illiislralcd  Magazine  of  Natural  History  and  Travel. 


lA\t<n  on  btulncu  coaaccl«<l  with  lh<-  Ahrhicam  NArvHALMT  iliould  It  addrtiKd  u  tha  Puttliihfn,    McC*LtJk  fc 
Stavilv,  liji)  Doik  Simi.  Phll«ilil|>Ms.  P«. 

Jioo  Pine  St.,  pHiLAorLPHfA,     ^yZ.^         i88'A<r 
fC^t^iy-'y,^.€i^y^^^^//^-2r-£y1^Cy^  ^'^Tr^-^  //AjC     aXv^<» <_ 


C'^'\^/^^\yirt-\/^^     •'V^^J-v-'VC? 


c£o^^^/ 


LETTER   FBOM   E.    D.    COPE 


239 


240       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

itor.  The  mind  that  grappled  with  the  most  in- 
tricate problems  in  herpetology,  ichthyology  and 
mammal og5%  could  condescend  to  'scout  for  sub- 
scribers.'    Cope  wrote: 

Glad  to  hear  of  your,  appointment.  Does  the  insti- 
tution take  such  journals  as  the  Naturalist?  We  are 
on  the  scout  for  subscribers !  I  send  you  a  late  screed 
on  primitive  man. 

In  the  foregoing  pages,  incidental  mention  has 
been  made  of  Dr  Pepper,  but  no  account  of  the 
sons  of  the  university  would  be  complete  without 
his  dominating  and  vigorous  personality.  Wil- 
liam Pepper  was  certainly  born  in  Philadelphia, 
in  1843 — the  same  year  that  Clevenger  was  born 
in  Florence.  Each  had  a  distinguished  father, 
but  otherwise  their  paths  diverged.  Clevenger's 
journey  was  so  devious  that  he  himself  did  not 
know  where  he  was  going,  but  Pepper  went 
straight  to  his  goal.  There  was  nothing  vision- 
ary about  Pepper  ;  he  did  not  dwell  in  the  clouds, 
but  at  1811  Spruce  Street.  Current  morality, 
including  Newport  society,  did  not  revolt  him, 
and  instead  of  attempting  to  improve  the  Re- 
publican Party,  he  voted  for  it.  He  was  never 
a  voice  crying  in  the  wilderness — he  believed  in 
a  chorus.     He  marched  in  the  van  of  his  genera- 


The  Philadeljjhia  Group  241 

tion — but  he  never  stepped  aliejid  of  it.    He  was 
a  leader — but  not  a  reformer. 

As  a  practitioner  and  consultant,  as  a  teacher 
of  clinical  medicine,  as  a  research  worker,  and  as 
an  editor  and  author,  Pepper  made  his  mark,  but 
it  was  as  provost  of  the  University  of  Pennsyl- 
vania that  he  became  the  most  celebrated  man  in 
Philadelphia.  Whoever  reads  the  Reminiscences 
of  a  Provost,  written  by  Pepper's  predecessor, 
Charles  J.  Stille,  will  see  what  an  impotent, 
meaningless  position  it  was  prior  to  1881,  but 
Pepper  made  it  a  place  of  power.  He  was  a 
strong  man  whose  limitations  were  his  fortune, 
for  he  believed  Philadelphia  was  the  American 
paradise,  and  that  the  center  of  that  heaven  was 
the  University,  and  that  the  pivot  of  the  Uni- 
versity was  the  provostship. 

With  his  social  standing,  his  faultless  dress, 
his  gracious  manner,  and  the  'Pepper  smile' 
which  entered  into  the  traditions  of  Philadelphia, 
he  moved  mountains.  The  University  needed 
money,  and  Pepper  admitted  he  could  plead  for 
money  as  a  man  pleads  for  his  life.  He  was  a 
magnificent  beggar,  and  no  one  else  unloosened 
so  manj^  Philadelphia  purse-strings.  jNlen  who 
swore  that  Pepper  would  never  see  a  dollar  of 
theirs,  succumbed  to  his  suavity,  and  contributed 


242        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

thousands.  As  the  prince  of  persuasiveness,  he 
had  no  rivals.  Whatever  he  desired,  he  obtained 
— whether  it  was  an  ancient  Moorish  vase  from  a 
Mexican  collector  who  vowed  he  would  never 
part  with  it,  or  a  new  museum  from  an  obdurate 
city  council.  He  wheedled  the  best  teachers  in 
the  country  to  joining  his  Faculty  at  the  lowest 
salaries ;  financiers  and  politicians  he  met  on  their 
own  ground,  and  came  away  victorious.  He 
could  bamboozle  people  beautifully. 

His  plans  were  so  multitudinous  that  to  carry 
them  into  effect  he  was  forced  to  consort  with  all 
sorts  of  individuals,  but  Pepper  was  not  squeam- 
ish, and  he  never  hesitated  to  make  use  of  a  man 
simply  because  that  man  happened  to  be  his  en- 
emy. As  a  matter  of  fact,  Pepper  was  too  busy 
to  waste  any  time  in  bickering.  As  a  vertebrate 
paleontologist,  Cope  has  been  ranked  with  Cu- 
vier,  Owen  and  Huxley;  and  such  was  the  suc- 
cess of  Pepper's  conciliatory  adroitness,  that  he 
was  compared  to  those  wily  cardinals  of  the  sev- 
enteenth century,  Richelieu  and  Mazarin.  'I 
am  seeking,'  confessed  Pepper,  'so  many  favors 
from  so  many  different  people  in  so  many  dif- 
ferent directions,  which  is  all  very  complicated, 
I  feel  like  a  juggler  with  many  plates  spinning, 
and  all  must  be  touched  at  the  right  spot.' 


^ 


^^f^.^>^/^'^^^^--<-^       ^^  ^^^^-^f-^^^ 


<^ 


y/^. 


'^y^-^  tTT-n^i-t^ 


^./Cex^-S''^^ 


C<.*^^^ 


LETTER    FROM     WILLIAM    PEPPER 

to   E.   D.  Cope,  concerning  Clevenger's  honorary  A.M.      Sent  by  Cope  to 
Clevbnger,  and    containing  Cope's  signature  in  the  upper  right-hand  corner 


243 


244        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Pepper  was  ambitious,  but  his  ambition  was 
never  personal — it  was  for  his  ideal  University. 
When  he  began  to  collect  contributions  for  a  new 
undertaking,  he  headed  the  subscription-list  with 
a  liberal  donation  from  his  own  pocket — in  this 
W'ay  he  gave  away  nearly  half  a  million  dollars 
which  he  had  earned  in  the  practice  of  his  pro- 
fession. Pepper's  administrative  duties  checked 
his  research-work,  but  he  kept  up  an  enormous 
consulting  practice  which  took  him  all  over  the 
country.  No  other  physician  in  America  was 
known  to  so  many  conductors. 

Pepper's  triumphs  were  not  all  gained  by 
smiles  and  suavity;  often  he  was  forced  to  fight 
like  a  titan  for  his  plans.  His  life  was  spent  in 
presiding  over  meetings,  and  after  one  of  these 
meetings  he  uttered  these  characteristic  words: 
'I  gathered  up  the  Faculty  into  one  hand  last 
night  and  swung  it  as  a  stick.'  His  passion  for 
work  was  almost  pathologic,  but  the  only  rem- 
edy for  his  rare  disease  was  more  work.  Unlike 
Paul  La  Fargue,  he  did  not  believe  in  the  right 
to  be  lazy. 

At  rare  intervals.  Pepper  experimented  with 
a  vacation,  but  he  could  not  enjoy  rest.  One 
summer,  while  recuperating  at  Mrs  Hearst's 
home  in  Pleasanton,  he  declared:    'It  is  all  very 


The  Philadelphia  Group  245 

well  to  prate  of  contentment  and  y)leasure,  but  1 
am  debauched  by  affairs,  and  know  no  peace  ex- 
cept in  the  midst  of  full  activity.'  Pepper  was 
a  commander  who  could  set  groups  of  men  into 
motion,  and  while  one  group  was  working  for 
better  boulevards  and  purer  water  for  Philadel- 
phia, other  groups  were  excavating  Babylon, 
Egypt,  Italy,  and  Nippur,  because  Pepper  so 
willed  it — for  his  museums. 

It  had  been  Pepper's  habit  to  work  early  and 
late,  but  the  time  came  when  he  would  tire  at 
sundown.  Pepper  was  an  oak  that  bent  beneath 
the  long-continued  storms  of  overwork.  Every- 
one could  see  the  premature  wrinkles  on  his  brow, 
but  only  a  few  knew  that  Pepper  was  falling  in 
his  prime.  But  this  self-controlled  man  did  not 
whimper.  'I  did  it  deliberately,'  he  declared, 
'and  am  not  sorry,  but  must  pay  the  price.'  He 
was  the  embodiment  of  Henley's  Invictus. 

Even  in  the  closing  years.  Pepper  refused  to 
drink  from  the  cup  of  indolence.  'If  it  costs  me 
my  life,'  he  said,  'I  will  see  this  thru.  Now  don't 
tease  me  about  it ;  arguing  makes  me  nervous  and 
lessens  my  strength.  I  must  go  on  till  the  end.' 
Pepper  did  not  work  with  any  hope  of  future  re- 
ward, and  his  ringing  words   on  this   subject 


246       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

should    be    nailed     on    every    church-door    in 
Christendom : 

It  would  make  not  a  stiver  of  difference  if  I  were  to 
learn  sure  that  death  is  to  be  the  end-all  and  the  be-all 
of  the  business;  the  work  is  here;  there  is  value  in  it. 
It  will  help  otliers ;  we  cannot  let  it  alone  undone,  or 
we  should  be  more  unhappy  than  as  it  is.  Let  us 
leave  teleology  alone. 

Pepper  had  many  admirers,  but  his  achieve- 
ments are  his  most  eloquent  eulogists.  He  cre- 
ated the  Free  Library  of  Philadelphia,  and  the 
Free  Museum  of  Science  and  Art,  and  when  he 
founded  the  Philadelphia  Commercial  Museums, 
he  opened  them  with  an  exposition  which  the 
President  of  the  United  States  attended — after 
a  personal  interview  with  this  irresistible  or- 
ganizer. As  provost,  William  Pepper  estab- 
lished the  following  university  departments:  the 
Wharton  School  of  Finance  and  Economy,  the 
Biologic  Department,  the  Department  of  Philos- 
ophy, the  Veterinary  Department,  the  Training 
School  for  Nurses,  the  Department  of  Physical 
Education,  the  University  Library,  the  Gradu- 
ate Department  for  Women,  the  Department  of 
Hygiene,  the  Department  of  Architecture,  the 
Wistar  Institute  of  Anatomy  and  Biology,  the 


The  Philadelphia  Group  247 

William  Pepper  Laboratory  of*  Clinical  Medi- 
cine, and  the  Department  of  Archeology  and 
Paleontology.  Benjamin  Franklin  laid  the 
corner-stone  of  this  temple,  but  William  Pep- 
per was  its  chief  builder. 

Pepper's  clinical  and  biographical  papers  are 
well-written,  and  his  two  addresses  on  Higher 
Medical  Education — the  first,  delivered  October, 
187T,  and  the  second,  October,  1893 — were  im- 
portant contributions  to  the  subject,  and  are  still 
valuable  for  ideas  and  data,  but  his  most  notable 
literary  work  is  the  System  of  Medicine  which 
appeared,  1885-6,  in  five  massive  volumes.  It 
was  an  imposing  undertaking,  which  could  have 
been  carried  to  completion  only  by  a  man  like 
Pepper  or  Gross — a  man  of  equanimous  tem- 
perament and  magnetic  personality,  with  a  wide 
acquaintanceship.  The  leaders  of  American 
medicine  contributed  to  this  magnificent  System 
which  has  now  been  superseded,  but  not  sur- 
passed, by  that  of  Osler — and  except  where 
Pepper's  System  has  become  antiquated,  we  pre- 
fer it  to  Osler's. 

Pepper  issued  the  original  prospectus  of  the 
work  in  1881,  and  among  those  to  whom  he  ap- 
plied was  Clevenger,  altho  Dr  Clevexger's  di- 
ploma was  then  only  two  years  old.     Pepper's 


248        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry    ~ 

first  communication  to  Clevenger  is  dated  No- 
vember, 1881: 

The  accompanying  Prospectus  will  explain  itself.  I 
undertook  the  work  with  reluctance,  but  the  cordial 
favor  and  unanimous  cooperation  of  all  whom  I  have 
invited  to  write  for  it  has  been  very  gratifying  to  me. 
The  complete  success  of  the  work  is  now  assured,  and 
much  of  the  material  has  been  allotted;  but  some  very 
interesting  and  important  chapters  are  still  unas- 
signed. 

I  write  now  to  ask  if  you  will  be  good  enough  to  un- 
dertake the  preparation  of  the  articles  on  Alcoholism, 
Opium  Habit,  Toxic  Neuroses.  See  page  7.  The  MS 
will  not  be  expected  before  October,  1882,  so  that  ample 
time  exists  for  the  preparation  of  the  articles. 

Pray  send  me  a  half-rate  night  telegram  at  my  cost. 

Ten  months  later — September,  1882 — Pepper 
wrote  as  follows  to  Clevenger: 

In  answer  to  your  request  I  would  state  in  confi- 
dence, that  as  your  articles  form  part  of  the  last  vol- 
ume of  the  System  of  Medicine,  I  can  allow  you  until 
March  1st,  1883,  on  or  before  which  time  it  is  essential 
I  should  receive  them. 

This  shows  that  Clevenger  had  accepted  Pep- 
per's offer,  but  desired  an  extension  of  time  for 


WILLIAM  PEPPER 


The  Philadelphia  Group  249 

his  articles.  Then  the  new  time  arrived,  but 
Clevenger's  manuscripts  were  not  on  the  way 
to  Philadelphia.  In  the  meanwhile,  however,  he 
had  seen  Pepper,  and  told  him  what  valuable  ma- 
terial he  had  on  alcoholism.  During  June,  1883, 
Pepper  wrote  to  Clevenger: 

After  you  left  I  reflected  on  what  you  had  said  about 
your  valuable  material  on  Alcoholism.  Would  it  not 
suit  you  better  to  write  that  article  and  the  one  on 
Toxic  Neuroses  from  mineral  substances? 

This  would  enable  me  to  get  Dr  Kane  of  New  York 
to  write  up  Opium,  Chloral,  Tea,  etc.,  and  he  could 
probably  make  a  very  good  companion  article  for 
yours.  If  it  suits  you  as  well,  it  will  suit  me  better. 
Please  write  me  at  once.  You  could  have  until  April 
1st,  1884,  to  complete  your  MSS. 

But  it  seems  Cle^tenger  was  unwilling  to  re- 
linquish any  of  his  topics,  for  tho  he  had  not  done 
one,  he  believed  he  could  complete  all.  In  the 
following  month — July,  1883 — Pepper  was  sup- 
posed to  be  abstaining  from  work  at  Newport, 
but  evidently  he  took  a  supply  of  postage-stamps 
with  him.  Clevenger,  who  was  at  Dunning,  re- 
ceived this  letter  of  explanation  and  congratu- 
lations : 

That  is  right.  I  will  give  you  for  Opium  and  Toxic 
Neuroses  till  April  1st,  1884.     I  am  glad  you  antici- 


250       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

pate  a  trip  thru  those  regions,  and  hope  you  add  what- 
ever valuable  information  you  may  acquire  on  these 
subjects.  I  congratulate  you  on  being  so  situated  that 
3^ou  can  look  forward  to  steady  scientific  work.  The 
authorities  are  certainly  to  be  warmly  applauded. 

Another  spring  arrived,  but  Clevenger's  ar- 
ticles did  not,  and  on  the  twenty-fifth  of  May, 
1884,  Pepper  sent  Cleatenger  a  note  which  was 
more  categorical  than  congratulatory: 

Since  our  meeting  the  first  volume  of  our  System  of 
Medicine  is  being  pushed  rapidly  thru  the  press.  I 
must  now  know  just  when  to  expect  the  manuscript 
for  the  three  latter  volumes.  I  write  to  ask  you  to 
favor  me  by  return  mail  with  a  line  stating  exactly 
what  you  are  preparing  for  me,  when  I  may  count 
upon  the  manuscript  without  fail,  and  how  many  pages 
it  will  make. 

All  this  was  too  definite  for  Clevenger; 
harassed  with  a  variety  of  plans,  and  wrangling 
with  Mike  McDonald's  gang,  he  was  in  no  state 
of  mind  to  prepare  monographs  for  America's 
first  System  of  Medicine — and  at  the  eleventh 
hour  he  told  Pepper  so.  Pepper  may  have  been 
annoyed,  but  he  replied  with  equanimity: 

It  would  have  been  easier  for  me  had  you  notified  me 
of  your  inability  to  prepare  your  articles  as  soon  as 


The  Philadelphia  Group  251 

you  became  convinced  of  it.  I  shall,  however,  imme- 
diately secure  some  successor,  tho  I  am  sorry  we  shall 
not  have  you  among  our  list  of  authors. 

So  the  final  volume  appeared,  without  Clev- 
enger's  contributions,  but  with  gratifying  words 
by  William  Pepper.  In  the  valedictory  pref- 
ace, he  gave  the  date  of  publication  of  each  vol- 
ume, and  added  these  comments : 

In  view  of  the  delays  inevitable  in  large  and  compli- 
cated literary  enterprises,  such  unusual  punctuality  re- 
flects credit  alike  on  the  zeal  of  the  contributors  and 
the  energy  and  resources  of  the  publishers.  The  du- 
ties of  the  Editor  have  been  lightened  and  rendered 
agreeable  by  the  unvarying  courtesy  and  cordial  co- 
operation of  all  connected  with  him  in  the  undertak- 
ing; and  he  has  been  amply  rewarded  b}'  the  realiza- 
tion of  his  hopes  in  the  favorable  reception  accorded 
to  the  successive  volumes  by  the  profesison  on  both 
sides  of  the  Atlantic.  The  plan  of  the  work  has  been 
strictly  adhered  to,  and  the  articles  promised  have 
been  furnished  without  exception,  altho  in  a  very  few 
cases  circumstances  required  a  change  in  the  author- 
ship.  .   .  . 

In  conclusion,  the  Editor  feels  that  it  is  a  subject  of 
congratulation  that  thru  the  combination  of  so  many 
leading  members  of  the  profession  it  has  been  rendered 
possible  to  present  in  this  work,  for  the  first  time,  the 


252       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

entire  subject  of  practical  medicine  treated  in  a  man- 
ner truly  representative  of  the  American  School. 

In  Clevengee's  place,  Pepper  secured  the  dis- 
tinguished James  Cornelius  Wilson,  who  con- 
tributed the  chapters  on  Alcoholism,  The  Opium 
Habit  and  Kindred  Affections,  and  Chronic 
Lead-Poisoning ;  these  essays  do  not  betray  the 
circumstances  of  their  origin,  for  tho  conceived 
in  haste  and  brought  forth  under  stress,  they  are 
choice  in  language  and  rich  in  scholarship.  Sev- 
eral years  later,  Clevenger's  articles  on  Alcohol- 
ism and  Morphinism  and  Other  Addictions,  ap- 
peared in  the  second  volume  of  his  Medical 
Jurisprudence  of  Insanity,  but  both  in  diction 
and  in  information,  they  are  less  meritorious  than 
Wilson's. 

Clevenger's  absence  from  Pepper's  System 
of  Medicine  was  like  staying  away  from  a  family 
reunion,  for  many  of  his  friends  were  represented 
in  its  five  thousand  octavo  pages :  James  Nevins 
Hyde  wrote  on  variola,  varicella,  and  erysipelas ; 
H.  D.  Schmidt  wrote  on  dengue  and  contrib- 
uted to  the  diseases  of  the  nervous  system; 
Joseph  Leidy  wrote  a  treatise  on  intestinal 
worms;  Harrison  Allen  wrote  on  diseases  of 
the  nasal  passages;  E,  C.  Dudley  wrote  on  dis- 


The  Philadelphia  Group  258 

placements  of  the  uterus;  E.  C.  Seguin  wrote  on 
the  general  semeiology  of  the  nervous  system; 
and  CiTARTJcs  K.  Mim.s  and  E.  C.  Spitzka  also 
contributed  generously  to  the  neurological  vol- 
ume. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
FRIENDS  IN  NEW  YORK 

HAD  Pepper  edited  a  System  of  Surgery 
in  the  eighties,  he  would  probably  have  en- 
listed the  services  of  that  rising  young  surgeon, 
RoswELL  Park.  Dr  Park  was  born  in  Con- 
necticut, but  received  his  academic  education  in 
the  Racine  College  of  Wisconsin,  and  his  med- 
ical training  at  the  Chicago  Medical  College. 
When  Clevenger  matriculated  at  this  institu- 
tion, Park,  altho  nine  years  Clevenger's  junior, 
was  already  a  member  of  the  faculty,  in  the  de- 
partment of  anatomy.  Later,  he  lectured  on 
surgery  at  the  Rush  Medical  College. 

Clevenger  and  Roswell  Park  frequently 
met  at  the  Chicago  Biological  Society,  of  which 
Park  was  secretary.  One  of  the  mimeographed 
announcements  which  Park  sent  to  the  members 
has  been  preserved: 

The  regular  meeting  of  the  Biological  Society  will 
be  held  Wednesday,  May  5th,  8  p.  m.  at  the  Tremont 
House.     Dr  P.  S.  Hayes  will  report  a  Case  of  Exoph- 

254 


Friends  in  New  York  2.55 

thalmic  Goitre — fatal.  The  Secretary  will  exhibit  a 
case  of  I  ho  same  disease, — and  also  rc'f)ort  three  Un- 
usual Cases  of  Poisoning,  Dr  C'i.evkxgeh  will  report 
a  Case  of  Poisoning  from  the  P^xtcrnal  Use  of  Cor- 
rosive Sublimate.  The  ('ommittee  on  the  Deleterious 
Action  of  Glucose  as  an  Adulteration  will  report. 

In  1883 — the  central  date  of  this  narrative — 
Edward  Mott  Moore,  one  of  the  celebrated  sur- 
geons of  the  day,  resigned  his  chair  at  the  Buf- 
falo Medical  College,  which  immediately  ap- 
pealed to  Moses  Gunn — Chicago's  surgical  over- 
seer— for  a  successor.  Professor  Gunn  sug- 
gested RoswELL  Park,  then  in  his  thirty-first 
year,  and  both  Park  and  the  College  accepted 
the  offer.  However,  when  the  new  professor  ar- 
rived in  Buffalo,  he  found  this  chilly  welcome  in 
the  pages  of  the  Buffalo  Medical  Journal: 

Professor  Moore's  resignation  is  a  loss  to  the  pro- 
fession of  this  city  as  well  as  to  the  College.  It  is  but 
fair  to  say  of  liim  that  he  is  recognized  as  the  ablest 
professor  of  surgery  in  this  country.  We  learn  that 
Dr  RosM'ELL  Park  of  Chicago  has  been  appointed  in 
the  place  thus  vacated.  We  fail  to  ascertain,  after 
repeated  inquiries  in  surgical  circles,  that  the  new  ap- 
pointee brings  to  this  responsible  position  any  exten- 
sive experience  or  reputation. 


256       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

In  the  light  of  subsequent  events,  these  caus- 
tic comments  are  amusing,  for  Roswell  Park 
became  Buffalo's  big  man,  looming  like  a  colos- 
sus aboA^e  his  colleagues,  as  Byron  Robinson 
did  at  the  Toledo  Medical  College.  Besides  be- 
ing president  of  such  professional  organizations 
as  the  American  Surgical  Association,  and  the 
Medical  Society  of  the  State  of  New  York,  and 
director  of  the  New  York  State  Cancer  Labora- 
tory, he  was  president  also  of  the  Philharmonic 
Society,  and — what  was  more  substantial — of  the 
Spencer  Lens  Company. 

Park  was  the  author  of  a  text-book  on  Mod- 
ern Surgery,  and  in  addition  to  technical  con- 
tributions, he  delved  into  medico-historical  fields, 
writing  various  essays,  and  compiling  an 
Epitome  of  the  History  of  Medicine.  As  a 
writer  he  possessed  no  special  talents,  and  his 
medico-historical  work  is  like  that  of  the  Boston 
surgeon,  James  Gregory  Mumford — worth 
while,  but  not  notable. 

In  1887,  Moses  Gunn  rested  from  his  labors, 
and  the  chair  of  surgery  at  Rush  Medical  Col- 
lege stood  empty;  but  soon  it  was  filled  by 
Charles  Theodore  Parkes,  a  man  whose 
boundless  enthusiasm  for  operative  surgery  was 
fostered  by  his  unusual  physical  strength.    Pro- 


Friends  in  New  York  257 

fessor  Parkes  was  a  pioneer  investigator  of  gun- 
shot wonnds  of  the  intestines.  He  would  anes- 
thetize dogs,  shoot  them  several  times  in  the  belly, 
then  perform  laparotomy,  followed  by  closure 
of  the  perforations — and  'the  number  of  recov- 
eries in  his  animals,'  says  J.  H.  Etheridge,  'as- 
tounded the  medical  profession,  and  led  to  fur- 
ther experiments  in  all  parts  of  the  world.'  Huge 
of  limb  and  heavy,  but  carrying  himself  with  the 
grace  of  the  all-around  athlete  and  sportsman, 
Parkes  moved  like  a  ruddy-faced  giant  among 
the  diminutive  nurses  and  assistants  of  his  clinic. 
Death  seemed  far  off  from  that  magnificent 
physique,  but  in  1891,  several  months  before  he 
reached  his  forty-ninth  birthday,  he  was  stricken 
by  the  most  sudden,  silent,  subtle  murderer 
known  to  medicine — Pneumonia. 

That  same  day,  Roswell  Park  received  this 
telegram  from  Professor  Etheridge: 

Parkes  died  this  morning.  Can  I  present  your  name 
as  his  successor?     Biggest  place  in  America  today. 

It  was  a  critical  moment  for  Roswt^ll  Park. 
Compared  with  the  Rush  INIedical  College,  the 
medical  department  of  the  University  of  Buffalo 
was  a  place  of  minor  importance.     Park  carried 


Br.  Roswell  Park 

^e^s  teane  to  announce  tkat  he  ka;  accepted  the  Stjair 
cf  ^ur^ery  in  ifie  T^ea'ical  ^epartmerit  of  the  XJ nivefsiiy 
of  "^uffalo,  arid  cjill  concequenily  remove  to  that  city 
during  the  latter  part  of  ^u^uci 

Cliicngo,  ynly,  tS3j. 


^^. 


vk:. 


ROSWELL  PARK  S   ANNOUNCEMENT 

of  his  removal   to  Buffalo,  containing  his   request  for  a  copy  of   Clevenger's 
paper  on  the  thyroid  and  thjinus. 


258 


Friends  in  New  York  2.59 

this  telegram  around  with  him,  and  showed  it  to 
certain  parties.  He  said  nothing  ahout  Buf- 
falo's lesser  reputation,  but  he  hinted  that  unless 
more  adequate  equipment  and  new  buildings 
were  forthcoming,  he  would  deem  it  expedient 
to  answer  the  telegram  in  the  affirmative.  Happy 
is  the  man  whom  an  institution  fears  to  lose. 
Park  was  assured  that  his  desires  would  receive 
prompt  attention,  and  he  decided  to  stay  where 
he  was.  But  Etheridge  was  not  easily  balked, 
and  the  wires  from  Chicago  to  Buffalo  waxed  hot 
with  his  telegrams.  But  in  this  instance  his  per- 
sistence was  of  no  avail,  and  his  final  telegram 
said: 

My  heart  is  broken.  We  will  have  3'ou  in  a  few 
years.  I  never  abandoned  anything  more  reluctantly. 
I  love  you  very  much. 

So  RoswELL  Park  remained  in  Buffalo,  and 
the  passing  years  brought  him  increasing  respect 
and  reputation.  When  William  ^IcKinley 
was  wounded  there,  all  eyes  turned  to  Dr  Park  ; 
he  became  a  national  figure,  and  it  w^as  an  un- 
dying disappointment  to  him  that  he  was  unable, 
in  spite  of  all  his  efforts,  to  save  the  President's 
life.  On  the  twenty-fifth  anniversary  of  Park's 
professorship,   a  banquet  was   arranged   in  his 


260         The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

honor,  and  the  men  who  attended  were  ample 
testimony  to  the  position  which  Roswell  Park 
had  reached,  for  Dennis  and  Brewer  came  from 
New  York,  and  Crile  from  Cleveland;  Chicago 
sent  Billings  and  Bevan,  and  Richardson 
journeyed  from  Boston;  out  of  the  northwest 
came  Mayo,  and  from  the  south,  Matas  and 
Welch. 

The  present  writer  claims  to  be  the  champion 
symposiumist  of  America,  having  conducted  and 
published  symposiimis  on  humanitarians  (1908), 
euthanasia  (1913),  sterilization  of  the  unfit 
(1914),  drugs  (1916),  obstetrical  abnormalities 
(1916),  and  the  medical  profession  (1917). 
None  of  these  collections  of  diverse  opinion  ex- 
hibited more  dissimilitude  than  the  Symposium 
on  Euthanasia — Shall  the  state  permit  science  to 
put  a  painless  end  to  a  hopeless  disease?  As 
usual,  the  question  aroused  heat  and  hysteria; 
most  of  the  physicians  proclaimed  it  their  duty 
to  keep  life  alive,  no  matter  how  painful  and  un- 
desirable that  life  is  to  its  possessor,  and  no  mat- 
ter how  persistently  and  piteously  the  incurable 
or  deformed  sufferer  begs  for  the  waters  of 
Lethe.  But  others  came  to  the  defense  of 
euthanasia,  arguing  that  we  have  no  right  to  force 
life  upon  a  patient  when  that  life  is  one  con- 


Friends  in  New  York  2G1 

tinuous  round  of  agony,  and  that  it  is  the  pro- 
fession's duty  to  alleviate  pain  and  not  to  prolong 
death-tortures.  Among  those  who  took  this  view 
was  RoswELL  Park,  whose  contribution  con- 
tained the  sensational  confession  that  he  not  only 
believed  in  euthanasia,  but  practised  it: 

I  know  that  others  have  assumed  the  responsibility, 
which  I  have  myself  taken  in  more  than  one  case,  of  pro- 
ducing euthanasia,  when,  in  the  terminal  stage  of  life, 
a  patient  was  suffering  the  tortures  'of  the  damned,' 
and  has  pleaded  for  a  method  of  escape,  the  pleadings 
being  seconded  by  the  family.  Under  these  circum- 
stances I  think  that  to  administer  a  lethal  dose  of  mor- 
phine or  chloroform  is  to  'do  as  one  would  be  done  by.' 
I  have  been  told  by  high  legal  authority  that  to  do 
this  is  equivalent,  in  the  eyes  of  the  law,  to  commit- 
ting murder.  Nevertheless  no  one  need  allow  his  con- 
science to  trouble  him  on  this  score.  I  am  positive 
that  it  is  one  of  the  kindest  acts  that  a  medical  man 
can  ever  perform. 

For  this  enlightened  standpoint,  Park  was 
deluged  with  a  shower  of  abusive  epithets,  and 
altho  he  was  a  minister's  son,  he  was  accused  of 
violating  the  precepts  of  religion.  Roswell 
Park  invariably  side-stepped  theology;  in  his 
letter  to  Clevenger,  dated  July,  1894,  he  says: 


Oft    WILLIAM  A.   HAMMOND  43  Wer.t  y,\h   Si  .   New  Vork 

CONSULTATldll    HOURS   fSOU 


l^     ^^  7^  /lAfl^  ^ 

^-i  ^^  ^^C-^  t^^^^ly^ 

LETTER    FROM    WILLIAM    A.    HAMMOND 


262 


Friends  in  New  York  263 

I  am  very  much  obli/red  to  you  for  writing  to  me  as 
you  did  about  that  book.  It  was  one  which  my  FaHic  r 
published  not  long  after  I  was  born ;  and,  had  I  not 
several  copies  now  on  hand,  I  should  be  desirous  of  se- 
curing the  one  of  which  you  write.  As  it  is,  I  have  no 
use  for  it,  and  can  only  thank  you  warmly  for  your 
kindness  in  writing  to  remind  me  about  it.  I  am  my- 
self too  deep  in  medicine  to  delve  in  theology ;  and, 
whatever  else  you  may  see  from  my  pen,  you  will  see 
nothing  that  deals  with  eschatology  or  anything  of  that 
kind. 

I  have  read  and  often  recommended  your  book  upon 
the  spine,  and  have  wondered  many  times  what  had  be- 
come of  you,  and  it  has  done  me  good  to  get  your  letter. 
In  your  many  polemics  against  corruption  and  abuse 
in  asylums  and  hospitals,  I  have  watched  you  with 
envious  eyes,  and  have  wished  you  success  many  times 
when  you  did  not  realize  it. 

I  trust  that  you  may  even  yet  come  out  on  top  and 
maintain,  as  you  always  will,  the  honor  and  dignity  of 
our  profession. 

Among  Clevenger's  papers  we  find  this 
hastily-scribbled  note,  'Won't  you  go  to  Man- 
hattan Beach  this  afternoon  with  me?  If  so, 
meet  me  at  the  foot  of  22nd  St.,  North  River,  at 
3  p.  m.,'  from  one  of  the  most  interesting  per- 
sonalities of  the  tune, — William  Alexaxdee 
Hammond.     Born  in  Maryland,  and  graduating 


264       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

in  New  York,  Hammond  next  spent  some 
months  in  Philadelphia  and  Maine,  then  joined 
the  army  where  he  served  for  over  a  decade,  re- 
tiring in  his  thirty-first  year  to  return  to  Mary- 
land as  professor  of  anatomy  and  physiology  in 
the  university. 

But  the  following  year  there  was  war,  and 
Hammond  resigned  his  professorship  to  re-enter 
the  army.  Armies  have  inflexible  rules,  and  in- 
flexible rules  are  invariably  stupid.  Because 
Hammond  had  left  the  army  in  1859,  he  lost  his 
rank;  his  eleven  years  of  service  did  not  count, 
and  he  was  placed  at  the  foot  of  a  roll  of  inex- 
perienced assistant  surgeons. 

But  he  was  not  to  remain  inconspicuous  long. 
A  vigorous  Surgeon-General  was  the  crying 
need  of  the  hour.  The  nation's  medical  depart- 
ment, organized  to  look  after  fifteen  thousand 
men,  suddenly  found  itself  confronted  with  the 
task  of  taking  care  of  a  million.  A  consultation 
was  held  between  the  Secretary  of  War,  the  re- 
doubtable Edwin  McMasters  Stanton,  and 
the  Sanitary  Commission,  composed  of  such  dis- 
tinguished physicians  as  Cornelius  R.  Agnew, 
WoLCOTT  Gibes,  and  William  Holme  Van 
BuREN.  'Well,'  asked  Stanton,  'whom  would 
you    suggest?' — which    was    extraordinary   gra- 


Friends  in  New  York  265 

ciousness  on  his  part,  for  this  iron-willed  man 
rarely  allowed  suggestions.  The  members  of  the 
Sanitary  Commission  glanced  thru  the  list,  and 
Van  Buren  put  his  hand  on  the  name  of  Ham- 
mond, saying,  'That  is  the  man  whom  the  Sani- 
tary Commission  would  like  to  have.  I  know 
him,  and  served  with  him,  and  the  profession  has 
confidence  in  him.' 

Van  Buren 's  finger  toyed  with  destiny  that 
day,  for  the  surgeon-generalcy  has  ever  been  a 
slippery  place.  The  first  who  climbed  to  it, 
Benjamin  Church,  slipped  into  oblivion  and 
disgrace.  The  second,  the  famous  John  Mor- 
gan, was  soon  dismissed  by  Congress,  and  tho  he 
published  a  Vindication,  and  was  acquitted  by 
a  later  court  of  inquiry,  he  never  recovered  from 
the  ignominy.  His  successor,  William  Ship- 
pen,  Jr,  was  also  acquitted — but  not  before  he 
faced  serious  accusations  at  court  martial. 

Hammond,  however,  was  not  an  historico- 
medical  student — altho  he  was  so  enthusiastic 
about  Servetus  that  he  intended  to  write  a  book, 
burning  John  Calvin  in  ink.  But  the  fate  of 
his  early  predecessors  did  not  deter  him  from  ac- 
cepting the  surgeon-generalship — with  the  rank 
of  brigadier-general.  Hammond  was  large  and 
loud — when  he  entered  a  room,  he  filled  it.     He 


266       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

looked  splendid  in  his  uniform.  He  began  to 
work  at  once.  He  found  that  the  more  prev- 
alent malaria  grew,  the  higher  was  the  price  of 
quinine,  so  he  announced  that  the  Medical  De- 
partment would  manufacture  its  own  quinine — 
and  down  came  the  price  of  quinine.  Hammond 
created  the  Army  Medical  Museum,  projected 
that  magnificent  undertaking,  the  Medical  and 
Surgical  History  of  the  War  of  the  Rebellion, 
and  suggested  the  establishment  of  the  Surgeon- 
General's  Library,  but  here  he  was  balked  by 
Secretary  Stanton,  who  flatly  declared  such  a 
library  unnecessary. 

In  fact,  Stanton  didn't  like  Hammond — just 
as  Richelieu  didn't  like  Grotius.  At  every 
step,  Hammond  found  himself  opposed  by  this 
grim-lipped  statesman  whose  arbitrary  spirit, 
violent  temper  and  bitter  tongue  were  equalled 
only  by  his  efficiency,  courage  and  honesty.  So 
these  two  masterful  men  clashed,  but  a  surgeon- 
general  was  easy  game  for  the  autocrat  of  Amer- 
ican politics  who  drove  even  Lincoln  to  despair, 
who  came  within  one  vote — ah,  how  much  history 
has  hinged  on  one  vote — of  having  Johnson  im- 
peached, and  who  exchanged  blows  with  mighty 
Sheeman.  There  seems  to  have  been  some- 
thing mysterious  in  Hammond's  connexion  with 


Friends  in  New  York  267 

a  million  horse-blankets — or  was  it  with  drug- 
supplies  on  which  his  brother-in-law  grew  rich? 
The  Secretary  of  War  put  his  machinery  in  mo- 
tion, and  the  court  martial  pronounced  Ham- 
mond guilty,  deprived  him  of  rank,  and  dismissed 
him  in  disgrace.  Whether  Hammond  was 
blameless  in  the  matter  of  these  horse-blankets, 
or  whether  he  really  tried  tcK  indulge  a  bit  in  the 
well-known  American  game  of  'graft,'  we  can- 
not venture  to  say,  but  it  may  be  conceded  that 
his  summary  removal  was  due  chiefly  to  Stan- 
ton's enmity. 

A  weaker  man  would  have  succumbed  to  these 
'bludgeonings  of  chance,'  but  Hammond  came 
to  face  life  in  New  York.  His  colleagues  be- 
lieved in  him,  and  he  was  appointed  lecturer  in 
neurology  at  the  College  of  Physicians  and  Sur- 
geons; within  a  short  time  he  became  the  first 
professor  of  neurology  at  the  Bellevue  Hospital 
Medical  College,  but  resigned,  after  some  years, 
to  accept  a  similar  chaii*  at  the  New  York  Uni- 
versity Medical  College.  He  was  one  of  the 
principal  founders,  in  1882,  of  the  New  York 
Post-Graduate  Medical  School  and  Hospital, 
where  he  continued  to  teach  his  specialty  with 
considerable  success,  and  where  his  son,  Graeme 


268       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Monroe  Hammond,  is  professor  of  mental  dis- 
eases until  this  very  day. 

Hammond  was  not  the  sort  of  man  to  go  thru 
life  tamely  with  a  stigma  hanging  over  his  head. 
He  besieged  the  senators  until  Congress  surren- 
dered to  his  demand  for  a  review  of  the  court- 
martial  proceedings  which  had  deposed  him;  he 
presented  a  volume  of  evidence  in  his  defense, 
and  the  result  of  this  later  inquiry  was  favorable 
to  Hammond;  like  the  surgeon-generals  of  the 
revolutionary  period,  he  was  vindicated,  being 
restored  to  his  rank  of  brigadier-general  on  the 
retired  list — after  fourteen  years  of  disgrace.  If 
this  was  an  act  of  Justice,  then  Justice  needs  the 
services  of  an  orthopedist,  for  she  is  painfully 
lame. 

Hammond  was  a  voluminous  author,  and  as 
far  back  as  1863,  his  Physiological  Memoirs 
gained  him  a  reputation.  Among  his  numerous 
volumes  are  a  Treatise  on  Hygiene,  Lectures  on 
Venereal  Diseases,  Sexual  Impotence  in  the 
Male,  Treatise  on  Diseases  of  the  Nervous  Sys- 
tem, and  exposures  of  spiritualism  and  similar 
maladies.  In  1883,  both  Hammond  and 
Spitzka  published  a  work  on  Insanity,  Spitz- 
ka's  being  the  superior ;  these  were  the  first  sys- 
tematic treatises  on  insanity  published  in  Amer- 


Friends  in  New  York  269 

ica,  and  Dr  Clevenger  received  an  autographed 
copy  of  each.  In  after  years  Ci.evenger  do- 
nated Hammond's  copy  to  the  Atlantic  City 
Medical  Library,  and  presented  Spitzka's  copy, 
with  copious  marginal  notes,  to  the  present 
writer.  Had  Hammond  produced  fewer  vol- 
umes, probably  more  of  them  would  have  sur- 
vived. An  author  who  does  not  practise  birth- 
control  with  his  literary  progeny,  dooms  most  of 
them  to  early  extinction. 

Of  course,  the  versatile  Hammond  had  his 
hand  in  medical  journalism.  He  was  the  orig- 
inator and  editor  of  the  'Maryland  and  Virginia 
Medical  Journal,'  and  of  the  quarterly  'Journal 
of  Psychological  Medicine  and  Medical  Juris- 
prudence,' and  was  one  of  the  founders  and  ed- 
itors of  the  'New  York  Medical  Journal.'  Thus, 
for  an  important  post-graduate  school  and  an 
important  professional  journal.  New  York  is 
largely  indebted  to  the  efforts  of  William 
Alexander  Hammond. 

Unhappily,  Hammond's  boundless  energies 
could  not  be  confined  by  physiological,  psycho- 
logical, and  neurological  themes.  Now  and  then 
he  would  desert  these  erstwhile  favorites  in  order 
to  woo  literature — and  instead  of  keeping  these 
indiscretions  hidden,  he  published  them.     It  is 


270        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ixo  exaggeration  to  say  that  every  time  Dr  Ham- 
mond became  father  of  a  novel,  he  was  guilty  of 
a  literary  felony.  His  novels  are  horrible  stuff, 
whose  bad  taste  lingers  on  for  months,  and  never 
entirety  disappears.  Much  bad  fiction  has  come 
our  way,  but  the  three  worst  novels  we  ever  read 
were  produced  by  physicians:  The  Perverts,  by 
Dr  William  Lee  Howard;  the  Exploits  of  a 
Physician-Detective,  by  Dr  George  Frank 
Butler;  and  Lai,  by  Dr  William  Alexander 
Hammond. 

Hammond  had  more  assurance  than  modesty 
in  his  make-up,  and  he  confidently  believed  that 
in  time  he  could  solve  all  medical  problems — but 
he  didn't.  He  was,  however,  a  sagacious  inves- 
tigator, and  had  he  not  been  endowed  with  ad- 
ministrative ability — always  a  dangerous  gift  for 
a  scientist — and  had  he  stuck  more  faithfully  to 
his  laboratory,  his  fame  would  be  more  secure. 
Among  Hammond's  early  work  was  an  inves- 
tigation of  the  arrow  and  ordeal  poisons,  in  col- 
laboration with  Silas  Weir  Mitchell.  Thru- 
out  his  career,  in  carrying  on  his  researches, 
Hammond  experimented  uj)on  himself.  When 
the  oto-ophthalmologist,  Daniel  Bennett  St 
John  Roosa — whose  hybrid  name  is  due  to  his 
descent  from  Dutch,  French  and  English  set- 


^^^fV^SKfoi^ 


X^W^^^^ 


^^n.yi^^'l'^^^ 


Friends  in  New  York  271 

tiers — informed  Hammond  that  tlierc  were 
doubts  as  to  the  effects  of  quinine  upon  the  fun- 
dus oculi,  membrana  tympani  and  auditory 
nerve,  Hammond  insisted  upon  Q.{)n\\n<x,  to  Pro- 
fessor Roosa's  office  and  l)eing  dosed  with  all  the 
quinine  that  his  system  could  tolerate.  Oddly 
enough,  in  the  eighteenth  century,  there  was  a 
William  Alexander  who  may  be  regarded  as 
one  of  the  founders  of  pharmacology,  for  he  ex- 
perimented upon  himself  with  drugs  until  they 
very  nearly  killed  him. 

After  his  vindication,  Hammond  removed  to 
Washington,  where  he  conducted  a  sanitarium. 
He  was  one  of  the  most  conspicuous  of  contem- 
porary neurologists,  being  widely  consulted  and 
extensively  quoted.  He  was  the  first  to  describe 
mysophobia,  and  athetosis  is  know^n  as  Ham- 
mond's disease.  All  in  all,  he  w^as  a  type  of  the 
successful  American.  His  children  were  also 
successful,  his  son  becoming,  as  we  previously 
mentioned,  professor  in  the  post-graduate  school, 
and  his  daughter  becoming  the  Marquise  Clara 
Lanza. 

Leidy's  infatuation  with  w^orms,  Cope's  early 
interest  in  salamanders,  and  Harrison  Allen's 
fondness  for  bats,  were  matched  by  Burt  Green 
Wilder's  partiality  for  spiders.    At  the  age  of 


272       The  Don  Qvivote  of  Psychiatry 

fourteen,  his  study  of  spiders  brought  him  an 
encouraging  nod  from  the  elder  Agassiz.  Dur- 
ing the  Civil  War,  he  was  surgeon  to  the  Fifty- 
fifth  JNIassachusetts  Infantry — the  colored  regi- 
ment— but  his  devotion  to  spiders  did  not  cease, 
and  while  stationed  on  Folly  Island,  in  South 
Carolina,  he  discovered  a  'large  and  handsome 
spider' — named  Nephila  Wilderi  by  McCook — 
from  which,  while  alive,  he  reeled  150  yards  of 
yellowish  silk,  and  which  gave  him  a  taste  of 
fame. 

But  already,  other  creatures  had  begun  to  at- 
tract his  attention:  at  the  age  of  eighteen,  work- 
ing with  Jeffries  Wyman,  he  began  to  com- 
pare the  skull  of  men  and  apes;  at  twenty,  he 
published  his  Contributions  to  the  Comparative 
Myology  of  the  Chimpanzee;  and  later,  under 
Agassiz,  he  studied  the  anatomy  of  sharks  and 
rays. 

In  the  autumn  of  1867,  when  Cornell  Univer- 
sity opened  its  doors,  the  enlightened  Andrew 
D.  White  appealed  to  Asa  Gray  and  Louis 
Agassiz  for  a  teacher  of  natural  sciences.  They 
recommended  Wilder,  who  accordingly  was  ap- 
pointed professor  of  physiology,  vertebrate  zo- 
ology and  neurology.  His  laboratory  was  in  a 
basement — where  tools  were  later  kept — and  he 


Friends  in  New  York  278 

was  his  own  preparator,  assistant,  and  stenog- 
rapher, hut  he  was  only  twenty-six,  and  his  sci- 
entific ardor  was  intense. 

Twenty-five  years  later,  Professor  Wilder 
was  the  recipient  of  the  Wilder  Quarter-Century 
Book,  which  was  prohahly  the  first  of  American 
Festschrifts.  All  its  articles  were  written  by 
former  pupils  who  had  risen  to  eminence,  for 
Wilder  had  trained  such  men  as  David  Starr 
Jordan,  Leland  Ossian  Howard,  Theobau) 
Smith,  Hermann  Michael  Biggs,  and  Simon 
Henry  Gage. 

The  first  time  we  saw  Professor  Wilder,  it 
was  under  less  triumphant  circumstances.  He 
was  scheduled,  at  the  New  York  Academy  of 
Medicine,  to  lecture  to  the  ill-named  American 
Society  of  Sanitary  and  Moral  Prophylaxis  on 
certain  phases  of  the  venereal  peril.  He  arrived 
with  his  statistics,  but  found  to  his  consternation 
that  there  were  women  in  the  audience.  Wilder 
had  seen  women  before — he  was  the  father  of 
Ruth  and  Mary  and  Bertha — and  the  women 
whom  he  now  saw  before  him,  were,  with  a  few 
exceptions,  either  physicians  or  nurses,  but  they 
looked  like  other  women,  and  to  speak  of  chancre 
and  gonorrhea  in  their  presence,  was  more  than 
Wilder  could  do.     He  made  a  few  attempts, 


FROM  — 

ittirt  G.  Wilder,  SI.  D.,  S   "^ 

PROFESSOR   OF  *    H>^ 

Physiolo^,  Comparative  Anatomy,  and  Zoology,  §       — 

coKNBLL  uNivERMTv.  $*  _::: 

mnca,  .V.  v.,  CbVr    /    5      'S  ?5   I*  ^ 

7^      ^         /  l4 


^    = 


5        — 


CXy^-^"-^^ 


o- 


POSTAL    CARD   FROM   BURT  G.    WILDER 

showing  his  propaganda  for  the  metric  system 
274 


Friends  in  New  York  275 

held  up  his  awful  statistics  in  dismay,  and  sat 
down.  There  is  no  simj)licity  to  ecpial  the  un- 
worldly innocence  of  an  old  scientist.  While  the 
professor  had  buried  himself  in  his  laboratory 
at  Ithaca,  busy  with  cat's  brains,  sociology  had 
been  advancing,  and  venereal  disease  and  prosti- 
tution had  become  fashionable  topics  of  conversa- 
tion, indulged  in  by  ladies'  clubs  and  ministers 
seeking  popularity. 

It  should  not  be  supposed,  however,  that 
Wilder  was  usually  hesitant  in  expressing  his 
opinions;  being  a  scientist  and  not  a  politician, 
he  frequently  found  it  necessary  to  raise  his  voice 
on  the  unpopular  side.  During  our  first  year  of 
editorial  life,  we  raised  a  transient  tempest  by 
writing  The  Negro  in  American  Medicine,  in 
which  we  claimed  that  the  medical  profession  of 
America,  instead  of  enriching  anthropology  by 
impartial  and  objective  studies  of  the  negro,  was 
pandering  to  the  brutal  prejudices  of  the  mob, 
and  attempting  to  rival  the  infamies  of  a 
Thomas  Dixon.  After  turning  the  searchlight 
on  the  physician's  hypocrisy  in  this  matter,  we 
concluded  by  declaring  that  there  is  a  shameful 
chapter  in  American  medicine,  and  it  is  headed: 
The  Negro.  The  most  glorious  exception  to 
this  rule  is  Burt  Green  Wilder.     He  asserts 


276        The  Don  QuLrote  of  Psychiatry 

that  his  army  and  university  experiences  have 
often  tempted  him  to  saj^  'Yes,  a  white  man  is 
as  worthy  as  a  colored  man — provided  he  be- 
haves himself  as  well.'  When  that  sensation- 
springing  novelist,  Mr  Owen  Wister,  seeking 
to  wrap  himself  in  the  cloak  of  popularity,  made 
startling  and  dishonest  comparisons  between  the 
skulls  of  the  negro  and  the  ape,  Professor 
Wilder  exposed  his  errors  with  such  facts  and 
persistence  that  the  would-be  breeder  of  race- 
prejudice — altho  he  claimed  never  to  have  heard 
of  Wilder  before — was  compelled,  much  against 
his  inclinations,  to  modify  his  statements. 
Wilder's  monograph  on  The  Brain  of  the  Amer- 
ican Negro,  coming  from  one  of  the  foremost 
neuro-anatomists  of  modern  times,  sounds  a 
death-knell  to  the  white  man's  conceit,  and  is  a 
trumpet-call  to  a  capable  but  downtrodden  race. 
For  many  years  Wilder  not  only  advocated 
the  simplification  of  neuro-anatomical  nomen- 
clature, but  supplied  a  new  nomenclature,  so  it 
could  be  compared  with  the  old.  Wilder  was 
always  a  scholar,  and,  on  most  occasions,  a  gen- 
tleman, but  when  he  heard  the  resolution,  'that 
members  of  this  Association  should  defer  to  gen- 
eral usage,'  he  gave  way  to  a  passionate  denun- 
ciation of  that  universal  commander: 


Friends  in  New  York  277 

Of  all  so-called  leaders,  the  most  incupable,  blun- 
dering and  danf^crous  is  General  Usage.  He  stands 
for  thoughtless  imitation,  the  residuum  of  the  ape  in 
humanity;  for  senseless  and  indecorous  fashions,  the 
caprices  of  the  demi-monde;  for  sujoersl  ition  ;i.iid  hys- 
teria, the  attributes  of  the  mob;  for  slang,  the  language 
of  the  street  lioodlum  and  of  his  deliberate  imitator, 
the  college  'sport ;'  and  finally  in  science,  for  the  larger 
part  of  the  current  nomenclature  of  the  })rain.  As 
scholarly  anatomists  it  is  at  once  our  prerogative  and 
our  duty  to  scrutinize  and  reflect,  and  to  deal  with 
the  language  of  our  science  in  the  same  spirit  and  with 
the  same  discrimination  that  we  maintain  in  regard  to 
the  parts  of  the  body  and  the  generalizations  concern- 
ing them. 

The  sterilization  of  defectives,  the  simplified 
spelling,  the  use  of  chloroform  as  a  lethal  agent 
for  condemned  animals  and  criminals,  the  aboli- 
tion of  fraternities  and  intercollegiate  athletic 
contests,  the  removal  of  the  appendix  from  all 
young  children — these  are  a  few  of  the  reforms 
which  Wilder  has  advocated  with  little  success. 

At  the  age  of  seventy,  after  forty-two  years 
of  splendid  service  at  Cornell,  Professor  Wilder 
retired.  He  is  one  of  the  finest  representatives 
of  American  science,  but  the  man  in  the  street 
does  not  know  him,  and  neither  does  that  impos- 


278       Tlie  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

ing  authority,  the  Encyclopedia  Britannica, 
whose  eleventh  edition  devotes  many  columns  to 
some  of  our  loud-mouthed  politicans, — who 
added  nothing  to  the  sum  of  human  knowledge, 
— but  contains  not  even  a  casual  reference  to 
the  foremost  makers  of  American  medicine — 
the  Jacksons,  the  Warrens,  the  Bigelows, 
Horner,  Drake,  Nott,  Gross,  and  Marion 
Sims.  But  tho  the  Encyclopedia  Britannica 
knows  him  not,  Wilder  has  been  quoted  by  an- 
other British  authority — Charles  Darwin.  It 
was  Thackeray  who  said  that  to  have  your  name 
mentioned  by  Gibbon  was  like  having  it  written 
on  the  dome  of  St  Peter's,  for  pilgrims  from  all 
the  world  admire  and  behold  it.  Similarly,  the 
student  of  science  may  say  that  to  have  your 
name  inscribed  in  the  Descent  of  Man,  is  to  write 
it  down  for  farthest  posterity. 

Clevenger  is  indebted  to  Wilder  for  adding 
Clevengers  fissure  to  neurological  nomencla- 
ture; these  two  neurologists  became  personally 
acquainted  at  the  Boston  meeting  of  the  Amer- 
ican Association  for  the  Advancement  of  Sci- 
ence, where  Wilder  read  three  papers  on  the 
structure  and  nomenclature  of  the  brain,  with 
special  reference  to  that  of  the  cat,  and  Cleven- 
ger read  his  plan  of  the  cerebro- spinal  nervous 


Friends  in  New  York  279 

system.  Wii>der,  in  his  October,  1880,  letter  to 
Clevenger,  discusses  the  latter's  famous  Scliool 
of  Biology — which  never  opened  its  doors. 
Wilder  devised  the  correspondence-slip,  in 
1884,  and  on  August  sixteenth  of  that  year, 
wrote  to  Clevenger: 

I  inclose  a  slip  bearing  a  question,  the  answer  to 
which  may  be  written  on  it.  For  some  time  past  I 
have  felt  that  much  scientific  correspondence  might  be 
profitably  carried  on  in  this  *slip-shod'  way;  what  do 
you  think? 

I  wish  you  could  attend  the  coming  meeting  of  the 
A.  A.  A.  S.,  and  present  some  paper  on  the  brain  as 
well  as  discuss  mine. 

The  slip  which  Wilder  enclosed  bore  this 
query: 

Do  you  still  hold  your  view  as  to  the  morphological 
significance  of  the  cerebellum,  especially  in  view  of 
Spitzka's  recent  article  in  Record?  The  evidence  of 
it  does  not  appear  to  me  either  in  your  paper  or  in  the 
preparations  I  have  made. 


CHAPTER  IX 
LETTERS  FROM  SPITZKA 

SINCE  this  slip  still  remains  attached  to 
Wilder's  note,  we  do  not  know  whether 
Clevenger  ever  answered  the  question,  but  it  is 
certain  he  was  interested  in  Spitzka's  view.  We 
now  approach  the  longest-lasting  and  most  im- 
portant friendship  which  Clevenger  ever 
formed.  Edward  Charles  Spitzka  was  born 
in  New  York,  in  the  latter  part  of  1852,  and  thus 
was  nearly  ten  years  younger  than  Clevenger. 
At  the  age  of  twenty-one  he  received  his  M.D. 
from  New  York  University,  and  as  his  father 
was  a  successful  jeweler,  the  young  doctor  could 
afford  to  do  post-graduate  work  at  Leipzig  and 
Vienna.  At  Vienna  he  came  under  the  influence 
of  the  neurologist  Meynert,  and  the  author  of 
Diseases  of  the  Fore-Brain  never  had  a  better 
pupil. 

But  Theodor  Meynert  was  not  the  only 
force  that  swayed  Spitzka  in  those  days.  Since 
the  New  Yorker  was  away  from  home,  he  had  to 

280 


Letters  from  Spitzka  281 

eat  in  a  boarding-house — and  there  he  met  her. 
She  was  of  the  homespun  variety,  capable  of 
making  a  devoted  and  durable  wife.  Of  course 
her  name  should  have  been  Gretciien,  but  it 
happened  to  be  Katiiekine  Watzek;  however, 
it  was  soon  changed  to  Frau  Spitzka.  So  Dr 
Spitzka  returned  to  New  York,  carrying  in  his 
pocket  Meynert's  certificate  and  a  marriage-cer- 
tificate. It  was  not  a  happy  home-coming.  The 
jeweler  thought  Mrs  Spitzka  was  not  flashy 
enough  to  wear  his  diamonds  in  society,  and  in 
wrath  he  turned  his  son  out  of  doors.  Hard 
times  followed;  Dr  Spitzka  had  been  brought 
up  as  a  scholar,  not  as  a  business-man,  and  had 
not  yet  learnt  the  trick  of  making  money.  Once 
he  came  into  possession  of  an  elephant's  head, 
and  worked  thruout  the  night  to  get  the  brain 
out  of  the  sloill,  but  in  the  cool  of  the  morning 
he  found  to  his  despair  that  he  did  not  have  a 
coin  for  alcohol.  He  walked  the  streets  in 
tears,  and  before  he  obtained  the  twenty-five 
cents,  the  elephant's  brain  had  spoiled.  Eliza- 
beth Barrett's  father  never  forgave  his  daugh- 
ters who  married,  but  a  reconciliation  occurred 
between  the  elder  and  younger  Spitzka. 

The     friendship     between     Clevenger     and 
Spitzka  began  in  1879,  when  Clevenger  sent 


282       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

Spitzka  a  cordial  appreciation  of  the  latter's 
Architecture  and  Mechanism  of  the  Brain,  which 
was  appearing  serially  in  Professor  Jewell's 
journal.  It  was  certainly  a  masterly  piece  of 
work,  and  Spitzka  was  only  twenty-seven  at  the 
time.  Jewell  himself  broke  his  usual  editorial 
reserve  to  praise  his  brilliant  contributor: 

We  would  no  longer  defer  calling  the  special  atten- 
tion of  our  readers  to  the  articles  of  our  talented  young 
contributor,  Dr  E.  C.  Spitzka,  of  New  York  City.  We 
have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that,  as  a  whole,  they  have 
not  been  equaled  by  any  series  of  articles  that  have 
appeared  on  the  same  subjects,  in  the  whole  range  of 
American  medical  literature.  Whether  we  consider  the 
vast  amount  of  labor  they  represent,  the  breadth  and 
accuracy  of  his  information  respecting  the  best  liter- 
ature of  his  subject,  or  the  talent  exhibited  for  critical 
interpretation  of  facts  and  results,  we  think  our 
thoughtful  readers  must  acknowledge  with  us,  that 
their  author  is  entitled  to  no  ordinary  commenda- 
tion. 

Even  the  abuse — and  it  was  plentiful — which 
was  showered  upon  Spitzka  during  his  career, 
was  to  his  credit.  For  example,  J.  J.  Elwell's 
fulmination  in  the  Alienist  and  Neurologist,  ex- 
poses the  mental  calibre  of  one  class  of  Spitzka's 


Letters  from  Spitzka  283 

opponents — vacuousness,  filled  only  with  rancor- 
ous prejudice: 

Spitzka  is  a  weak  echo  of  a  clasj;  of  modern  crazy 
German  pagans,  who  arc  trying,  with  what  help  they 
can  get  in  America,  from  such  scientific  alienists  as  he, 
to  break  down  all  the  safeguards  of  our  ('hristian  civi- 
lization, by  destroying  if  possible  all  grounds  for  hu- 
man responsibility,  putting  forth  the  cold  vagaries  of 
agnosticism  and  nihilistic  utilitarianism — accepting 
nothing  beyond  the  reach  of  uncertain  human  experi- 
ment and  his  own  fallible  reason — reconciling  the  ir- 
reconcilable factors  of  life  and  human  existence. 

Spitzka  rose  rapidly  to  the  top  of  his  profes- 
sion, becoming  at  an  early  age,  president  of  the 
New  York  Neurological  Societ}'-,  professor  of 
medical  jurisprudence  and  of  the  anatomy  and 
physiolog}^  of  the  nervous  system  at  the  New 
York  Post-Graduate  School  of  INIedicine,  and — 
unfortunately  for  his  repose — professor  of  com- 
parative anatomy  at  the  Colimibia  Veterinary 
College.  This  connexion  with  a  veterinary  in- 
stitution gave  his  enemies  a  hint:  they  spread 
the  report  that  Spitzka  was  a  horse-doctor — and 
obtuseness  and  viciousness  accomplished  the  rest. 
No  amount  of  explaining  that  Spitzka  was  sim- 
ply teaching  comparative  anatomy — the  noble 


284        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

science  which  occupied  the  best  hours  of  a 
Hunter,  a  Huxley,  a  Haeckel — sufficed  to 
wipe  out  the  stain.  In  courts  of  law,  where  he 
was  called  to  testify  as  an  expert,  he  was  apt  to 
hear  the  question,  'But  you  are  a  horse-doctor, 
are  you  not?'  And  the  idea  of  a  horse-doctor 
posing  as  an  alienist  was  sure  to  bring  a  know- 
ing smile  to  the  brutish  lips  of  ignorance. 

Spitzka  finally  grew  tired  of  denying  that  he 
was  a  veterinarian,  and  on  an  unforgettable  oc- 
casion, being  irritated  by  the  old  question,  'But 
you  are  a  horse-doctor,  are  you  not?'  Spitzka 
turned  upon  his  tormentor,  and  answered,  'In 
the  sense  that  I  treat  asses  who  ask  me  stupid 
questions,  I  am.'  Thus,  Spitzka,  who  laid  no 
claim  to  the  mantle  of  a  humorist,  added  a  classic 
joke  to  the  annals  of  American  psychiatry. 
While  Spitzka  was  being  reviled  in  law-courts 
as  a  horse-doctor,  he  was  being  cited  in  the 
Smithsonian  Reports  as  an  outstanding  author- 
ity on  cerebral  anatomy.  But  in  the  quiver  of 
reason  there  is  no  arrow  sharp  enough  to  pierce 
the  armor  of  stupidity.  To  the  end  of  his  days, 
this  great  scientist  was  dogged  by  the  title  of 
horse-doctor. 

Whenever  Clevenger  came  to  New  York,  it 
was  an  interesting  day  for  himself  and  Spitzka; 


E.  C.  SPITZKA 


B.  G.  WILDER 


Letters  from  Spitzha  285 

not  often  could  either  of  them  encounter  a  com- 
panion who  was  willing  to  sit  up  all  night  dis- 
cussing suhjects  in  which  there  was  no  money. 
But  they  were  not  top-heavy,  and  did  not  take 
themselves  too  seriously.  They  mixed  section- 
cutting  with  relaxation.  They  enjoyed  Coney 
Island,  and  all  its  fakes.  They  often  strolled 
thru  Central  Park,  visiting  the  Zoo.  They  fre- 
quented the  Aquarium,  as  Spitzka  was  a  great 
student  of  fish.  They  chatted  in  a  summer-gar- 
den, over  their  beer  and  cheese.  Once  they  went 
to  the  Bowery  Theatre,  cheap  and  tough.  The 
thrilling  melodrama  dragged  on  past  midnight, 
and  the  villain  was  still  pursuing  her,  when  the 
manager  came  upon  the  stage  and  announced  in 
a  sad  voice,  that  the  authorities  compelled  the 
theatre  to  close  at  that  hour.  Someone  in  the 
audience  yelled,  'Hurrah  for  the  authorities,'  and 
the  two  neurologists  were  much  amused. 

As  Clevenger  was  the  elder,  it  was  naturally 
'taken  for  granted  that  he  would  die  first,  and  on 
one  occasion,  while  standing  near  an  elevated 
station  on  Third  Avenue,  he  remarked  to 
Spitzka:  'I  don't  see  why  you  take  brains  out 
occipitally.  I  think  the  old  method,  cutting  off 
the  calvarium,  is  less  apt  to  injure  them.' 


286        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

'I  prefer  the  occipital  method,'  said  Spitzka, 
'I  do  it  nicely  that  way.' 

'But  when  you  take  out  my  brain,'  rejoined 
Clevenger  casually,  speaking  like  a  true  mem- 
ber of  the  American  Anthropometric  Society,  'I 
want  you  to  do  it  by ' 

'No,'  insisted  Spitzka,  'I'll  extract  it  occip- 
itally,'  and  then  began  an  argument  as  to  how 
Spitzka  was  going  to  remove  Clevenger's  en- 
cephalon,  but  suddenly  seeing  the  comic  side  of 
this  discussion,  they  broke  into  laughter  and  ran 
up  the  steps  to  catch  an  approaching  train. 

Friendship  is  based  upon  a  subtle  chemistry, 
for  human  beings  are  swayed  by  the  law  of  op- 
posites  as  surely  as  is  the  atom.  Clevenger  and 
Spitzka  were  wholly  dissimilar.  Clevenger 
was  an  unsettled  character,  impetuous  and  un- 
practical, soaring  high  one  day  in  exultation,  and 
landing  the  next  day  in  the  ditch  of  depression. 
Spitzka  was  more  slow-pulsed,  and  we  picture 
him  walking  along  life's  highway,  steady,  sober, 
his  cane  striking  bottom  every  time.  Clevenger 
was  always  poking  his  nose  in  the  center  of  the 
universe,  and  appealing  to  everybody;  Spitzka 
stuck  to  his  section-cutting,  and  addressed  him- 
self only  to  specialists.  He  made  no  appeals  to 
the  public,  and  only  once  did  he  write  for  the 


Letters  from  Spitzka  287 

general  practitioner,  and  that  was  when  he  pub- 
lished his  admirable  Manual  of  Insanity. 

Nevertheless,  Spitzka  was  a  voluminous  au- 
thor, and  altho  most  of  his  writings  were  tech- 
nical, there  is  a  splendid  swing  to  his  sentences, 
at  times  the  true  Spencerian  sweep.  Yet  it  was 
Clevenger  who  was  the  Spencerian;  Spitzka 
preferred  Wundt. 

The  relationship  between  Spitzka  and  Clev- 
enger was  frankly  that  of  teacher  and  pupil — 
but  the  younger  man  was  the  teacher.  With  the 
possible  exception  of  Spencer  and  Darwin,  no 
name  appeared  so  frequently  in  Clevenger's 
work  as  the  name  of  Spitzka,  but  in  Spitzka's 
writings  the  name  of  Clevenger  is  not  men- 
tioned at  all,  unless  we  except  some  letters  pub- 
lished in  Science,  and  the  preface  to  the  sec- 
ond edition  of  his  Manual  of  Insanity,  where  he 
gives  Clevenger  credit  for  aid  received. 

During  his  rare  visits  to  Professor  Spitzka, 
Clevenger  met  a  little  Spitzka,  whose  tower- 
ing ambition  in  those  days  was  to  tear  the  covers 
from  his  father's  bulky  German  periodicals. 
Burt  Wilder  called  him  the  'worthy  son  of  an 
eminent  father,'  and  at  thii'ty  Edward  Anthony 
Spitzka  became  the  professor  of  anatomy  at  the 
Jefferson  Medical  College,  and  is  known  to  a 


288        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

host  of  students  as  the  American  editor  of 
Geay's  Anatomy.  Yet  it  was  not  often  that 
Clevenger  was  able  to  ascend  the  steps  of  137 
East  50th  Street — a  thousand  miles  stretch  be- 
tween Chicago  and  New  York.  But  the  two 
alienists  corresponded  enthusiastically,  especially 
from  1880  to  1884,  and  it  is  our  privilege  to  give 
some  of  Spitzka's  letters  to  the  world — that  is, 
to  that  infinitesimal  fraction  of  the  world  which 
will  read  these  lines. 

Edwaed  Charles  Spitzka's  first  letter  to 
Clevenger,  dated  the  eighth  of  December,  1879, 
refers  to  Spitzka's  Architecture  and  Mechanism 
of  the  Brain,  but  deals  largely  with  that  night- 
mare of  authors — typographical  errors: 

Your  very  welcome  favor  is  received.  It  is  very 
gratifying  to  know  that  my  article  has  been  of  some 
service  to  anyone  and  coming  from  such  a  source,  the 
commendation  which  you  are  so  kind  to  bestow  is  of 
special  value. 

The  word  'black'  should  be  'blank'  and  is  so  corrected 
in  the  reprints  of  which  I  will  send  you  one  with  the 
next  lot  that  goes  out.  The  line  (a)  is  omitted  by  the 
printer;  it  was  present  as  a  straight  perpendicular  in 
my  original  design. 

Your  kind  offer  to  furnish  me  with  certain  brains  is 
noted;  should  I  get  thru  my  present  material  I  will 


Letters  from  Spitzka  280 

perhaps  presume  on  jour  kindness  to  that  extent.  At 
present  I  have  fine  brains  going  to  pieces  because  I 
have  not  leisure  enough  to  utilize  them  properly.  And 
one  reason  why  I  deferred  tlic  continuation  of  my  ar- 
ticle is  that  I  expect  to  discover  some  points  which 
should  be  introduced  but  which  I  prefer  to  confirm 
before  so  doing. 

With  the  friendliest  greetings  to  yourself  as  well  as 
to  Dr  Jewell. 

P.  S.  There  are  other  typographical  errors,  some 
of  which  I  felt  sure  I  had  corrected  or  that  were  cor- 
rect in  the  original  proof. 

So  this  was  the  opening  of  a  friendship  which 
sometimes  flagged,  and  even  wore  itself  out  with 
the  passing  years,  but  nevertheless  left  pleasant 
memories.  Even  Gilbert  and  Sullivan  had 
their  misunderstandings,  so  let  us  not  be  sur- 
prised that  Clevenger  and  Spitzka  finally 
drifted  apart. 

During  August,  1880,  Clevenger  was  in  New 
York,  staying  at  the  Metropolitan  Hotel,  and 
on  the  twelfth  of  the  month,  Spitzka  sent  him 
this  letter: 

Now  that  I  have  a  little  breathing  time,  I  am  going 
over  my  collection  of  brains  ready  for  slicing,  and 
while  so  doing  laid  to  one  side  some  specimens  that  may 


290        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

be  of  service  to  you  in  your  work  on  the  Cornu  Am- 
monis.  If  you  will  come  tomorrow  afternoon,  say  any 
time  after  two  and  before  five  (for  we  want  daylight), 
I  will  show  you  things  that  will  make  your  mouth  water ! 

It  is  so  rarely  that  I  find  anyone  to  talk  to  on  this 
subject,  that  now  that  I  have  found  a  congenial  spirit 
I  find  it  hard  to  stop  talking,  and  my  diarrhea  of 
words  must  vent  itself  on  paper.  I  found  that  Paca 
brain,  the  specimen  is  something  marvelous,  and  on 
cutting  across  an  opossum's  I  find  the  most  clear 
confirmation  of  the  views  which  we  both  hold. 

I  had  intended  keeping  back  the  figures  of  these 
relations  till  the  third  chapter  of  the  Architecture,  but 
as  it  will  be  a  year  before  that  comes  out,  will  give  you 
the  chance  to  work  up  the  subject  from  my  specimens. 
All  that  I  shall  want  credit  for  is  the  remarkable  rela- 
tion in  the  Paca.  I  found  this  two  years  ago  and 
never  published  it,  but  it  would  be  well  to  incorporate 
it  in  your  paper. 

So  if  you  can,  do  not  fail  to  come  tomorrow.  I  have 
always  considered  the  Cornu  Ammonis  the  great  primi- 
tive gyrus  and  the  key  to  the  hemisphere's  homologies. 
In  my  first  (preliminary)  chapter  on  Architecture  and 
Mechanism  there  is  a  figure  showing  the  Cornu  Ammonis 
to  be  limited  to  the  dorsal  aspect  of  the  Corpus  Cal- 
losum  in  a  bat,  of  which  I  can  demonstrate  to  you  some 
representative  sections. 

Two  months  later,  Spitzka  wrote: 


Cyf-V^t^C'^      ''^*1--i 


LETTER    FROM    E.    C.    SPITZKA 


291 


292        The  Don  Quiocote  of  Psychiatry 

Your  kind  card  received.  On  condition  that  it  does 
not  interfere  with  Bannister,  I  am  very  willing  that 
you  should  mention  the  matter  you  propose  to  Dr 
Jewell.  You  know  I  am  not  very  ambitious  of  formal 
honors,  but  I  would  take  hold  of  the  Department  of 
Insanity  and  make  it  a  feature  of  the  Journal  if 
Jewell  sent  me  the  journals  on  Psychiatry  which  he 
receives.  I  am  very  much  obliged  to  you  for  thinking 
of  me. 

I  shall  have  a  long  article  of  one  hundred  pages  or 
so  in  the  January  number,  which  will  prove  the  best 
of  my  imperfect  contributions;  it  represents  the  re- 
sults of  labors  carried  on  for  five  years,  and  among 
other  things  deals  with  a  matter  which  may  interest 
you,  the  relation  of  convolutional  asymmetry  of  the 
atypical  kind  to  insanity. 

Can  you  inform  me  what  stereotyping  costs  per  page 
in  Chicago .f'  If  not,  and  you  see  Jewell,  jog  him 
about  it,  as  I  asked  him  the  question  and  have  not  yet 
been  answered,  probably  because  I  have  overwhelmed 
him  with  correspondence. 

I  hope  you  will  continue  your  anatomical  researches ; 
of  course  such  work  is  best  carried  on  at  leisure  and 
slowly,  and  the  'Big  Thing'  which  I  trust  will 
prove  a  success,  should  have  its  due  share  of  your  at- 
tention. What  you  like  to  do,  that  do;  wiUing  work 
always  yields  the  best  results. 

How  have  you  been  getting  on  with  your  fish  mu- 
seum.'' do  the  specimens  look  well.?  what  species  have 


Letters  from  Sjntzka  298 

you?  Can  I  do  anything  for  you  in  the  way  of  cas- 
ually harpooning  a  salt  water  species?  Have  you 
caught  that  18-foot  sturgeon  yet? 

By  the  twenty-ninth  of  October,  Spitzka  felt 
sufficiently  familiar  with  Clevenger  to  'pitch  in' 
into  him: 

I  have  received  your  paper  on  the  Central  Nervous 
System,  and  perused  it  with  pleasure.  It  is  on  the 
whole   a  very   suggestive   and  well   written   paper. 

I  regretted  to  note  one  very  ambiguous  feature.  In 
your  projection  system  you  put  down  the  external  and 
internal  capsule  as  homologues  of  the  afferent  nerves, 
and  the  crura  as  the  efferent.  Now  both  are  but  seg- 
ments of  one  and  the  same  continuous  tract.  If  you 
had  considered  a  part  of  this  entire  tract  involving 
both  segments  as  afferent  and  another  as  efferent  you 
would  have  been  anatomically  and  physiologically  cor- 
rect. In  fact  your  first  two  segments  could  not  be 
defended  even  theoretically.  I  felt  bad  over  it,  be- 
cause the  propositions  of  the  paper  generally  are  ex- 
cellent. 

Your  4th  segment  is  not  clear  to  me. 

Are  you  certain  that  you  have  interpreted  Biedsall 
correctly? 

You  know  my  habit  of  'pitching  in.'  'Him  whom  the 
Lord  loveth  he  chastiseth.'  I  would  not  say  this  if  I 
were  not  perfectly  sure  that  you  would  receive  the 


294       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

criticism  in  the  same  spirit  in  which  it  was  intended  by 
me. 

I  trust  you  will  not  abandon  your  work  on  the  Fish's 
Brain ;  there  is  nothing  we  regret  so  much  in  after 
years  as  time  thrown  away  on  undertakings  once  be- 
gun and  not  completed.  I  can  sing  a  song  to  that  tune 
myself  and  have  learned  a  lesson.  I  trust  you  will 
resume  what  I  consider  will  lead  to  important  results 
after  you  finish  your  new  matter. 

In  his  letter  of  November  eighth,  Spitzka 
told  Clevenger  what  he  thought  of  him  as  a  sci- 
entist : 

As  to  Drs  Jewell  and  Bannister,  I  agree  with  all 
you  say.  I  have  few  as  firm  and  disinterested  friends 
in  the  United  States.  Dr  Jewell  is  correct  in  assum- 
ing that  he  has  been  of  assistance  to  me.  Without  his 
Journal  I  might  have  been  crushed  by  the  Asylum  and 
New  York  Medical  Rings,  and  quite  aside  from  actual 
support,  his  word  of  encouragement,  dropped  at  the 
right  time,  has  done  me  more  good  than  all  the  adula- 
tion (real  and  pretended)  received  since.  He  has  been 
of  greater  service  to  me  in  pointing  out  my  faults,  and 
I  have  not  had  a  juster  critic.  On  one  occasion  he 
devoted  two  hours  in  New  York  to  giving  me  advice. 

People  ask  me  who  Clevenger  is,  and  it  may  interest 
you  to  know  my  objective  opinion,  both  of  yourself  and 
of  your  article:     'Dr  Clevenger  is  a  very  enthusias- 


% 
Letters  from  Spitzka  295 

tic  worker,  who  if  his  other  en^ugemenls  will  permit 
him  to  stick  to  the  researches  he  has  started  on,  will 
undoubtedly  accomplish  good  results.  His  present  ar- 
ticle is  too  speculative  in  character  to  be  criticized 
objectively;  it  exhibits  suggostivoness  and  ability  in 
its  theories  however,  and  these  qualities  if  combined 
with  objective  study  will  place  him  in  the  front  rank 
of  original  workers. 

I  still  think  that  your  frontal  and  occipital  lobe 
business  stands  on  the  empty  air,  even  with  the  present 
corrections,  while  the  facial  thalamus  theory  which 
can  be  better  defended  is  not  supported  by  any  ob- 
servations. 

I  am  getting  to  be  an  old  stager,  and  in  our  future 
correspondence  about  such  points  as  you  maj^  write 
about,  will  gladly  put  my  hints  in  an  available  form, 
so  that  at  least  I  shall  have  no  occasion  for  after  criti- 
cism. 

As  to  tools,  I  would  say  that  I  can  take  out  any  bony 
fish's  brain  with  notliing  more  to  aid  me  than  a  com- 
mon pocket-knife.  Your  fish  must  have  been  too  stale ; 
the  brain  softens  very  rapidly  after  death.  Don't  get 
frozen  fish. 

Your  German  is  very  fair.  The  concluding  clause  in 
English  reminds  me  of  Makk  Twain's  remarks  about 
his  fine  war  map,  where  he  changed  the  course  of  the 
river  Rhine  because  his  'graver'  had  slipped  in  wood 
cutting;  he  would  rather  have  changed  the  course  of 
the  Atlantic  Ocean  rather  than  lose  so  much  work. 


296        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

In  his  confidential  letter  of  November  thir- 
teenth, Spitzka  discusses  the  most  important  of 
all  subjects — money.  The  party  in  'financial 
straights'  was  Professor  Jewell,  who  borrowed 
a  thousand  dollars  from  Clevenger,  and  could 
not  repay  it  for  years.  If  Jewell  had  hunted 
for  advertisements  for  his  Journal  as  assiduously 
as  he  sought  for  valuable  reading-matter,  his 
affairs  would  have  been  less  precarious.  But 
such  is  the  world  in  which  we  live : 

Such  matters  as  you  mention  are  apt  to  make  one 
feel  in  reading  them  as  if  a  sudden  discord  had  taken 
place  in  the  midst  of  a  symphony.  I  know  from  due 
experience  what  you  mean  when  you  say  you  ought  not 
to  be  troubled  by  business  matters.  It  renders  one  un- 
able to  concentrate  one's  self  on  a  scientific  subject, 
to  devote  that  attention  to  it,  which  is  a  conditio  sine 
qua  non  of  good  deliberate  thinking  and  writing.  It 
is  not  the  mere  loss  of  cash  or  its  prospective  gain 
that  ever  depress  or  elevate  the  spirits  of  the  right  kind 
of  men,  but  the  privations  they  may  cause  or  the  good 
we  can  do  with  it. 

The  man  who  has  his  whole  depending  on  what  he 
can  make  from  day  to  day,  or  whose  chances  being  as 
yours  do  on  the  solvency  of  some  one  else,  is  torn  and 
ag-itated  to  such  an  extent  as  to  wish  that  he  were 
rather   at   some   fixed   meaner   (?)    occupation  with   a 


Letters  from  Spitzka  297 

regular  tho  small  incoinc,  unci  lot  scientific  aspirations 
go  to  the — wall !  I  have  lost  my  R'st  years  in  fretting 
on  similar  grounds,  and  my  irritability,  which  probably 
will  remain  a  constitutional  feature,  was  worst  at  that 
time,  and  there  it  originated.  I  suppose  I  was  never 
cut  out  to  become  insane,  but  from  my  individual  ex- 
periences regarding  worry  from  financial  causes,  I  have 
obtained  a  pretty  fair  idea  of  how  a  perfectly  sound 
brain  may  become  unsettled  from  such  causes, 

I  am  surprised  that  the  party  you  mention  should  be 
in  financial  straights  to  the  extent  of  borrowing  from 
a  younger  man.  But  I  suppose  it  is  a  temporary  mat- 
ter, and  think  it  may  be  connected  with  the  expenses 
of  the  Journal. 

May  you  not  yourself  be  at  fault  unconsciously  in 
this  matter.'^  I  have  an  impression  that  either  of  one 
of  the  gentlemen  wrote  me  that  you  had  made  consid- 
erable at  some  business  or  other,  and  possibly  your 
debtor  does  not  hesitate  to  borrow  since  he  has  an  idea 
that  you  can  afford  to  lend,  more  readily  than  is  the 
case,  and  would  refrain  from  borrowing  further,  if  he 
knew  the  real  state  of  affairs ! 

I  am  indebted  to  you  for  your  efforts,  you  know  how 
I  feel  regarding  the  matter,  and  I  can  afford  to  have  it 
put  off.  My  literary  engagements  are  horrible.  I 
publish  a  prize  essa}^  in  the  April  number,  the  Archir 
tecfwe  and  Meclianism  in  January,  a  dictionary  of 
insanity  terms  (polyglot)  thru  the  year,  and  probably 
will  get  out  a  book  or  two. 


298        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

.1  have  just  now  two  insane  murderers  to  defend.  I 
should  be  wiDing  to  withdraw  from  the  cases  if  I  could 
get  an  autopsy.  Matters  financial  have  been  picking 
up  with  me,  but  lately  there  has  been  a  relapse;  ups 
and  downs. 

In  his  letter  of  January,  1881,  Spitzka  gives 
Clevengee  the  sort  of  advice  that  is  needed  by 
a  Don  Quixote: 

Your  letter  pleased  me  very  much.  I  am  glad  to 
see  you  adhering  to  a  certain  line  of  work.  I  have 
seen  some  of  my  ablest  friends  the  victims  of  their  ver- 
satility, and  I  rejoice  when  one  of  them  sticks  to  one 
thing. 

I  would  advise  you  to  look  on  your  scientific  work  as 
a  relaxation,  and  not  to  lose  sight  of  the  practical 
money-making  aspect  of  life.  How  are  you  to  get 
books,  instruments,  specimens,  alcohol  and  glass,  un- 
less you  make  the  money  for  them?  Your  scientific 
work  will  not  bring  you  in  enough  directly  to  keep  you 
in  beer,  let  alone  to  starve  decently.  But  it  will  bring 
you  actual  financial  gain  indirectly.  A  physician  with 
actual  scientific  backbone  is  found  out  any  how,  if  he 
has  a  little  savoir  faire.  That's  your  policy.  Science 
for  amusement,  and  to  give  you  the  consolation  that 
you  will  advance  human  knowledge.  Medicine  to  earn 
the  dollars  to  enable  you  to  prosecute  Science.  You 
see,  a  circulus  vitiosus. 


Letters  from  Sjntzka  299 

I  sent  you  a  card  (of  congratulations)  in  regard  to 
your  article  in  Science. 

Wilder  and  I  are  in  frequent  correspondence.  He 
proposes  to  submit  his  paper  on  cerebral  nomencla- 
ture to  me  before  putting  it  in  print.  He  adopts  my 
optic  and  postoptic  lobe  matter.  My  best  work  is  yet 
coming,  and  I  will  keep  you  supplied  with  the  respec- 
tive papers. 

In  his  letter  of  February  eighth,  Spitzka  con- 
tinues his  common-sense  exhortations.  Inci- 
dentally, he  refers  to  Clevenger's  gynecological 
friend,  Dr  Dudley,  and  to  his  neurological 
friends,  Drs  Wilder,  Jewell  and  Bannister: 

Your  welcome  favor  was  received  several  days  since. 
I  cannot  venture  to  give  advice,  but  your  plan  of  get- 
ting to  the  starvation  point  seems  to  me  highly  un- 
practical and  unwise.  What  special  profit  it  can  pos- 
sibly be  to  you  to  follow  up  abstract  science  for  a  year 
and  put  yourself  in  a  position  of  inability  to  pursue  it 
any  further,  I  fail  to  perceive  or  comprehend.  What 
earthl}'  right  you  have  to  (using  your  own  language) 
'turn  upon  the  masses  and  ask  them  what  they  can 
give  me  in  return  for  what  I  have  tried  to  do  for  pos- 
terity,' it  is  equally  difficult  to  recognize.  You  might 
read  some  portions  of  Thackeeay  relative  to  the  disap- 
pointed aspirants  for  literary  honors,  with  a  good  deal 
of  enduring  profit. 


300        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

You  say  correctly  that  I  have  'been  thru  the  mill,' 
and  I  think  I  have  been  in  exactly  that  state  of  mind 
in  which  I  regret  to  find  you  agonizing  at  present — 
and  thank  my  star  that  I  am  out  of  it,  and  unless  you 
get  out  of  it  thru  an  exercise  of  deliberate  judgment 
on  your  own  part,  you  will  be  knocked  out  of  it  by 
the  rough  buffets  of  fortune. 

You  are  enough  of  an  experienced  man  of  the  world 
to  know  that  the  human  race  must  be  taken  as  it  is 
— not  as  it  should  be.  Suppose  everybody  who  took 
up  science  were  to  say  Hhe  world  owes  me  a  recom- 
pense a  year  from  now,'  and  suppose  the  claim  were 
admitted,  it  would  be  the  most  effectual  bar  to  progress. 
Take  your  own  work  for  example ;  so  far  as  published, 
it  contains  very  little  of  actual  established  fact,  and  a 
great  deal  of  promised  good  work  for  the  future.  But 
until  that  promise  is  cancelled  (  and  you  cannot  do  that 
under  several  years)  it  is  a  mere  promise,  and  the  world 
owes  you  absolutely  nothing  for  that. 

Now  this  is  very  plain  and  very  hard  talk,  but  I 
have  always  been  plainest  and  hardest  with  my  friends. 
I  never  dissimulate  or  bandy  polite  phrases  devoid  of 
meaning,  except  with  those  I  despise  or  dislike.  What 
I  say  I  think  is  the  unanswerable  truth,  and  I  say  it 
at  the  risk  of  misconstruction,  because  the  danger  in 
which  you  travail  at  present  appears  to  me  to  require 
a  loud  warning. 

As  regards  practice,  you  must  do  exactly  as  others 
do,  or  you  may  just  as  well  cut  your  throat  or  take 


Letters  from  Spitzka  801 

in  jour  shingle.  Your  first  duty  is  to  family,  your 
next  to  science,  your  next  to  the  world  at  large,  and 
claims  upon  your  time  should  be  exactly  in  that  order: 
first,  Family;  second,   Science;  third.  World. 

Dr  McBiiiDE  has  not  yet  tackled  the  subject,  being 
engaged  in  collecting  material — so  I  shall  keep  your 
letter  till  he  shall  be  able  to  consider  its  propositions 
in  the  light  of  his  own  results.  You  want  to  get  Prof, 
WiLDEii's  papers  on  the  pike's  brain.  I  think  you  will 
be  able  to  throttle  a  good  deal  said  there  and  at  the 
same  time  it  will  show  the  present  state  of  knowledge 
on  the  subject.  The  most  essential  thing  for  you  is 
Fhitsche's  work,  which  you  will  find  mentioned  in  the 
literary  references  of  my  article  or  rather  letter  to 
you  published  in  Jewell's  Joiirnal. 

There  is  no  one  else  working  up  the  fish's  brain  that 
I  know  of  in  this  country  from  the  same  point  of  view 
as  yourself.  One  of  my  pupils  interested  himself  in 
the  general  aspects  of  the  subject,  but  he  has  not  gone 
into  independent  research.  So  far  as  I  know  the  field 
is  comparatively  clear.  Above  all,  hurry  up  a  series 
of  fine  well-stained  longitudinal  and  transverse  micro- 
scopic sections  of  the  great  hoary  Lepidosteus ;  you 
can  get  him  from  the  Great  Lakes  and  the  Ohio.  That 
is  the  keystone  of  the  subject,  and  you  will  find  much 
to  publish  about  it  in  the  way  of  provisional  communi- 
cation. 

Dr  E.  C.  Dudley  called  on  me  yesterday. 

Give  my  respects  to  Drs  Jewell  and  Bakxisteb,  if 


302        The  Don  QuiTote  of  Psychiatry 

you  meet  them,  and  don't  take  anything  amiss  from 
your  friend. 

Spitzka's  letter  of  May  eighteenth,  contains 
several  interesting  observations,  including  his 
epigram  that  versatility  is  the  curse  of  genius : 

After  some  silence  I  take  advantage  of  a  lull  to  write 
a  little  more  at  length  on  some  points.  I  was  reminded 
of  you  by  every  issue  of  Science,  and  had  to  reproach 
myself  for  not  inserting  your  letter.  I  have  done  so 
today,  sent  it  in  with  a  few  remarks  of  my  own,  and 
by  the  way  pitched  into  Cope  a  little. 

Some  time  ago  I  read  over  your  papers.  I  do  not 
wish  to  be  complimentary,  but  they  show  that  you  have 
all  the  separate  materials  for  an  original  investigator, 
which  is  saying  a  great  deal  nowadays.  The  great  de- 
sideratum is  that  these  separate  materials  be  prop- 
erly associated.  You  have  suggestiveness  enough  for  a 
dozen,  and  not  facts  enough  for  one:  is  that  not  the 
truth  ?  If  it  is  not  so,  pardon  the  liberty  I  have  taken, 
but  it  had  seemed  so  to  me. 

There  is  for  example  your  theory  of  the  cerebro- 
spinal system  structure ;  it  is  full  of  ideas,  any  one  of 
which  would  furnish  work  enough  for  a  single  investiga- 
tor. What  have  you  done  to  sustain  your  propositions? 
Have  you  made  a  single  series  of  embryonic  prepara- 
tions, or  studied  the  nerve  centers  of  lower  vertebrates, 
higher  molluscs  and  arthropodes .''     If  it  is  true  that 


Letters  from  Spitzka  808 

DtjVAi.  of  I'aris  lius  confirinod  your  theory  by  actual 
observations,  you  have  robbed  American  Science  by 
permitting  an  outsider  to  stumble  on  wliat  you  had  ra- 
tionally anticipated  years  ago. 

I  write  this  .in  the  spirit  I  know  you  will  accept  it  in, 
or  else  I  should  leave  it  unsaid.  I  say  it  because  I 
consider  the  game  worth  the  candle,  because  I  feel  con- 
fident that  a  little  advice  will  aid  in  securing  good  work 
from  a  talented  source  which  would  otherwise  fritter 
away  its  time  in  generalities  and  that  versatility  which 
is  the  curse  of  genius,  and  because  I  beheve — and  if 
wrong  will  feci  only  too  glad  to  be  wrong — ^it  is  needed. 

You  may  ask  what  you  have  done  to  provoke  all  this 
— nothing;  the  whole  subject  came  to  me  in  a  manner 
altogether  independently  of  any  action  remotely  trace- 
able to  yourself.  I  got  three  splendid  alligators  alive, 
two  of  them  four  feet  long,  and  I  propose  to  have  them 
worked  up  by  one  of  my  pupils  under  my  direction, 
partly  to  use  them  experimentally  myself.  Looking  at 
them  and  thinking  what  a  mine  of  new  facts  lay  con- 
cealed in  the  animals  for  an  investigator  possessing 
your  quahfications,  I  was  led  to  denounce  the  circum- 
stances which  kept  you  in  Chicago  and  myself  in  New 
York.     I  am  sure  that  it  could  be  better  utilized. 

I  have  a  very  talented  pupil,  who  is  working  up  a 
different  subject,  of  less  biological  import  than  those 
you  ought  to  be  engaged  in.  Another  has  done  some 
work  on  the  cortex,  and  his  name  will  probably  stick 
to  the  center  which  he  saw  at  my  office  and  diligently 


304)        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

worked  up  in  the  human  brain.  You  could  beat  it  all 
if  you  would,  only  I  fear  that  you  have  been  discour- 
aged b}'  some  technical  difficulties.  Contradict  me  by 
letter. 

Among  Spitzka's  communications  to  Cleven- 
GER,  we  find  pages  five  and  six  of  a  letter  whose 
other  parts  have  disappeared;  the  date  is  there- 
fore lost,  but  we  will  insert  the  fragment  here,  as 
it  deals  with  the  topic  discussed  in  the  previous 
letter — Spitzka's  pupils.  Each  of  the  pupils 
mentioned  rose  to  distinction.  Graeme  Ham- 
mond we  have  already  met;  J.  Leonard  Corn- 
ing is  remembered  as  the  discoverer  of  spinal  an- 
esthesia; and  T.  A.  McBride  received  the  dedi- 
cation of  the  first  edition  of  Spitzka's  Manual 
of  Insanity — 'as  a  mark  of  the  author's  personal 
esteem,  and  an  humble  tribute  to  his  eminent 
services  as  a  teacher  and  original  investigator  in 
the  field  of  clinical  medicine.'  In  the  second  edi- 
tion, the  dedication  was  omitted  by  the  publish- 
ers, without  consulting  the  author.  Spitzka  was 
considerably  annoyed,  and  perhaps  McBride's 
vanity  was  wounded — but  how  little  it  really 
mattered!  Within  a  short  time,  McBride  be- 
came a  sick  man,  and  thought  of  nothing  except 
recovering  his  health:  he  undertook  an  ocean- 


Letters  from  Spitzka  805 

voyage,  and  died  on  the  way,  and  was  buried  in 
the  sea.     Spitzka  wrote: 

I  have  three  very  able  pupils  at  work.  l)r  Graeme 
Hammond  (I^r  W.  A.. Hammond's  son),  T)r  McBkide, 
President  of  Neurological,  and  Dr  J.  L.  Corning. 
They  arc  pupils  in  the  old  classical  sense  of  the  term, 
whom  it  is  a  relaxation  to  teach,  and  I  have  assigned 
work  according  to  taste  for  all  of  them.  Hammond 
found  a  new  cortical  center  knocking  (indecipherable). 
McBride  will  take  up  the  olivary  bodies. 

Possibly  you  may  be  able  to  come  to  New  York  when 
your  specimens  are  ready,  and  review  the  subject  here. 
Such  isolated  observations  as  you  make,  which  are  of 
individual  intcrst,  I  would  publish,  if  I  were  you,  in 
Science  with  a  figure  or  two  to  illustrate,  as  a  provi- 
sional communication,  or  in  Jewell's  Journal.  Make 
it  a  rule  to  keep  an  electrotype  of  every  cut  for  your 
systematic  treatise. 

At  one  time  Clevenger  was  so  misguided  as 
to  imagine  he  could  endure  life  as  a  magazine 
hack.  George  Gissing's  New  Grub  Street 
should  be  better  known;  in  fact,  an  enlightened 
State  should  present  a  copy  to  all  who  are  in 
danger  of  treading  that  thorofare.  Spitzka,  in 
his  letter  of  July  eighteenth,  tried  to  reason  with 
his  distracted  friend: 


306        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

I  sincerely  regret  and  sympathize  with  you  concern- 
ing your  discouragement.  While  I  would  say  nothing 
to  convince  you  against  your  bent  and  inclination  for 
purely  biological  studies,  yet  I  will  take  the  liberty  of 
offering  for  your  consideration  the  following  points 
into  which  you  may  look  before  leaping.  1st:  In  a  few 
years  you  will  have  attained  a  good  income — from  what 
I  hear  of  you,  you  can  not  fail  to  reach  this  desirable 
end.  2nd:  Scientific  work  is  poorly  paid  and  not  in 
equal  and  constant  demand.  3rd:  The  work  to  which 
you  propose  to  devote  yourself  involves  much  drudgery, 
petty  quarrels,  and  leaves  you  but  little  time  for  original 
labor,  less  in  fact  than  an  engrossing  practice  would. 
Of  course  there  is  the  advantage  of  seeing  periodicals 
and  being  in  constant  communion  with  the  general  field 
of  science. 

I  own  that,  egotistically,  my  preference  would  be  to 
have  you  in  New  York.  But  I  fear  you  overrate  my 
ability  to  direct  your  labors.  I  am  so  much  engrossed 
with  practical  duties  this  year,  and  will  be  more  so 
prospectively,  next  year,  that  all  I  shall  be  able  to  do 
for  my  pupils  will  be  in  the  line  of  suggestion.  If  I 
had  men  who  would  initiate  themselves  in  technology 
and  work  industriously,  I  could  give  each  of  them  a  no- 
ble field  to  work  up — I  have  given  away  two  such  fields 
already,  which  promise  a  rich  crop — and  would  rather 
have  one  pupil  like  yourself  than  a  dozen  of  the  aver- 
age kind  to  follow  up  these  things. 

I  shall  make  an  inquiry  of  the  Editor  of  Science  by 


Letters  from  Spitzka  807, 

letter,  as  to  whether  he  has  a  vacancy.  I  know  that 
he  paid  a  medical  student  during  the  winter,  and  be- 
lieve the  journal  is  a  paying  concern.  Possibly  you 
could  get  work  on  the  Nation,  and  such  like,  but  I 
fear  it  would  be  an  awful  grind !  You  could  easily  se- 
cure the  correspondcnceship  of  Dudley's  paper,  or 
some  other  western  journal. 

If  I  do  not  mistake  your  nature  greatly,  you  have 
written  your  note  under  the  effect  of  some  mood,  some 
disappointment,  and  you  would  regret  to  give  up  your 
present  independence  for  the  routine  drag  of  a  bio- 
logico-literary  hack,  on  reflection. 

If  this  is  not  the  case,  believe  me  I  shall  do  all  to 
further  your  desires  in  my  power,  and  in  this  light  shall 
let  you  know  of  the  result  of  my  inquiry  with  Michels. 

Evidently  Clevenger  soon  recovered  from 
this  aberration,  for  we  hear  no  more  of  his  desire 
to  don  the  harness  of  a  hack.  It  was  now  Clev- 
enger's  turn  to  render  Spitzka  a  service;  some 
of  the  former's  relatives  were  looking  for  a  med- 
ico-legal expert,  and  Clevenger  recommended 
Spitzka.  The  New  Yorker  w^as  anxious  for  an 
important  case  in  the  West,  and  in  his  letter  of 
August  fifteenth,  in  order  to  impress  Cleat:n- 
ger's  relations,  he  paraded  his  qualifications  by 
naming  the  conspicuous  cases  in  which  he  had 


308        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

appeared — a  remarkable  series  for  a  youth  who 
had  not  yet  reached  his  twenty-ninth  bu'thday: 

I  am  very  glad  that  everything  with  your  patient  is 
well.  Your  psychological  articles  read  very  well;  you 
ma}^  recollect  an  infantile  game,  where  an  object  is  con- 
cealed, and  as  the  seeker  gets  farther  away  or  nearer 
to  it  in  his  search,  the  cry  is  cold,  very  cold,  or  hot, 
very  hot.  Your  first  articles  were  somewhat  of  the 
frigid  zone,  but  the  recent  ones,  especially  the  last,  are 
very  hot,  and  there  is  a  very  happy  thought  concealed 
in  those  of  the  Science  series. 

I  have  been  watching  your  progress  with  some  solici- 
tude during  the  past  three  weeks.  You  will  admit  that 
there  was  some  occasion  for  it  when  you  recollect  that 
at  first  you  were  endeavoring  to  get  a  position  as  a  sci- 
entific hack,  then  to  start  an  opium  home,  and  now  to 
go  into  general  practice. 

I  am  much  obliged  to  you  for  your  kind  recommenda- 
tion. I  am  not  conceited,  but  I  should  not  for  a  mo- 
ment admit 's  name  to  be  weighed  in  the  balance 

with  mine.  If  you  wish  to  make  an  impression  in  my 
favor,  refer  your  relative  or  her  lawyers  to  my  report 
in  the  Radameier  case,  in  the  'St  Louis  Clinical  Record,' 
(just  out).  Dr  Hazard  will  send  them  one  if  they 
wish  it  and  mention  your  name.  I  shall  have  a  copy 
sent  you.  I  am  ambitious  to  have  some  big  medico- 
legal case  out  West,  one  that  will  pay  for  loss  of  prac- 
tice in  New  York.    I  have  already  a  degree  of  notoriety 


Letters  from  Spitzka  809 

there,  and  those  things  generally  reflect  buck  to  New 
York. 

If  I  liavo  occasion  to  call,  you  may  be  sure  that  I 
sliall  stop  in  Chicago,  to  hunt  up  the  not  inconsiderable 
circle  of  friends  I  have  there.  You  may  perhaps  men- 
tion that  I  have  been  an  expert  medical  witness  in  three 
murder  cases,  Porcello,  Munzberg,  and  Bigot,  one  ab- 
duction case.  Walker,  one  damage  suit,  Deputy-Haz- 
zard,  two  paretic  cases,  Martin  and  Goslvng,  one  cere- 
bro-spinal  sclerosis  case  of  undue  influence,  Higgins, 
one  case  of  neglect,  Cowley,  one  malpractice  suit,  Sayre, 
and  six  will  cases,  Murphy,  Leslie,  Dickie,  Ross,  Wal- 
lace and  Riegelmann,  and  seven  minor  cases.  I  have 
the  largest  expert  practice  in  New  York  at  present; 
of  the  fifteen  big  cases  enumerated,  the  side  which  called 
me  was  successful  in  ten,  the  issue  is  not  decided  in 
three,  and  three  were  decided  unfavorably :  the  Gosling 
case  (grossly  partisan),  the  Frank  Leslie  will  case, 
and  the  Ross  will  case,  both  of  which  have  been  ap- 
pealed. 

Alas  for  Clevenger's  recommendations,  and 
alas  for  Spitzka's  qualifications.  The  relatives 
— ^rich  in  the  world's  goods,  and  richer  still  in 
ignorance — refused  to  have  anything  to  do  with 
Spitzka,  because  they  had  heard  he  was  a  horse- 
doctor. 

In  his  letter  of  September,   1883,    Spitzka 


310       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

holds  up  to  Clevenger  the  adage  of  the  rolHng 
stone : 

Speaking  of  kicking  the  gluteal  region,  \Aould  it  not 
be  more  advisable  for  you  to  abandon  the  kicking  busi- 
ness altogether?  You  are  kicking  yourself  worse  than 
any  one  else,  and  it  is  a  great  pity.  What  warrant 
have  you  to  change  at  one  sweep  the  entire  political 
complexion  of  Cook  County?  You  have  naught  to  do 
with  this  fight ;  make  friends,  keep  your  place,  and  ac- 
complish something.  You  are  able  to,  but  not  willing 
to  do  this — it  seems  to  me.  In  my  experience  with 
mankind,  I  have  had  frequent  occasion  to  observ^e  per- 
sons of  excellent  parts  who  were  always  fretting  about 
the  little  put-backs  of  life,  and  letting  slip  the  great 
opportunity  of  presenting  the  unobtrusive,  patient  and 
promising  labors  of  which  they  were  capable.  Such 
persons,  agitated  by  alternate  fits  of  industry  and  dis- 
affection, rarely  illustrated  any  other  adage  than  that 
of  the  'rolling  stone.'  Now  suppose  that  you  are  turned 
out  of  the  asylum — the  worst  that  can  happen — will 
you  not  have  spent  your  time  more  profitably  in  col- 
lecting and  arranging  material  for  further  study  than 
in  empty  curses?  One  brain  which  I  took  out  last  sum- 
mer is  now  worth  to  me  more  than  all  the  polemical 
work  I  ever  engaged  in — unless  I  call  my  expert  rec- 
ord a  part  of  the  polemical  history  of  my  life. 

Now  do  not  believe  that  I  cannot  appreciate  your 
feelings  and  the  unpleasant  features  of  your  position; 


Letters  from  Spitzka  811 

but  the  contrast  between  your  expressions  of  a  few 
months  ago  and  of  today  is  really  ludicrous.  You  do 
not  perhaps  owe  it  to  your  profession,  to  science,  nor 
even  to  your  friends  to  do  honor  to  your  great  if  not 
last  opportunity,  but  you  owe  it  to  yourself  and  your 
past. 

Over  thirty-five  years  have  passed  since  the 
above  letter  was  written,  but  in  the  current  issues 
of  the  Chicago  Tribune  (December,  1918)  we 
read  that  conditions  are  unchanged  at  Dunning: 
the  same  sort  of  brutal  attendants,  the  same  sort 
of  brutal  murders ;  again  we  hear  of  'a  dozen  or 
more  recent  deaths  by  violence  at  the  Dunning 
Insane  Asylum.'  Harry  Varnell  may  be  dead, 
but  Varnellism  survives  in  Cook  County.  Dr 
Shobal  Vail  Clevenger's  life-work  has  ended 
in — failure. 

In  his  letter  of  November  ninth,  Spitzka 
quotes  another  adage  for  Clevenger's  benefit: 

Do  you  expect  to  succeed  without  many  failures? 
Could  you  not  glean  from  my  writings  how  few  satis- 
factory findings  reward  our  trouble  in  insanity? 

Your  suggestion  to  drop  pathology  after  so  cnthu- 
siasticall}^  going  into  it,  reminds  me  of  many  of  the 
other  extreme  acts  of  3our  career.  You  see  things 
either  too  rosehued  or  too  dark.     One  case  of  syphilitic 


312        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

dementia,  or  paretic  dementia  far  advanced,  thoroly 
analysed,  particularly  in  the  basilar  tract,  would  make 
your  reputation.  I  sincerely  trust  that  you  will  per- 
severe. Lack  of  success  is  due  to  lack  of  skill,  experi- 
ence or  knowledge,  and  the  fault  is  usually  with  the 
worker,  and  not  with  his  material.  To  give  up  is  hence 
to  argue  one's  incompetency.  Rome  was  not  built  in 
a  day,  and  it  is  absurd  for  you  to  expect  within  two 
months  to  accomplish  results  which  our  best  minds  of 
ripened  experience,  and  with  the  best  laboratories  at 
their  disposal,  are  still  striving  after. 

Spitzka's  letter  of  March,  1884,  discussing 
Clevenger's  attempt  to  secure  the  superinten- 
dentship  of  the  Pennsylvania  Hospital  for  the 
Insane,  re-introduces  us  to  some  of  our  old  ac- 
quaintances : 

I  need  not  assure  you  that  I  will  do  anything  in  my 
power  to  aid  you  in  accomplishing  your  purpose.  It 
is  indeed  not  only  on  your  own  account  that  I  wish 
you  to  succeed,  but  also  on  mine,  as  I  would  rather  have 
you  near  at  hand  than  far  distant. 

Unfortunately  I  had  a  little  dispute — in  which  I 
happened  to  be,  as  I  admitted  publicly,  in  the  wrong 
— ^with  members  of  the  Kirkbride  family,  so  that  it 
would  do  you  no  good  if  you  were  to  parade  my  recom- 
mendation of  you  before  that  particular  branch  of  the 
interests  controlling  the  appointment  you  are  seeking. 


Letters  from  Spitzka  818 

I  think  you  will  encounter  many  difficulties:  the 
position  is  a  high  one,  and  there  will  be  many  competi- 
tors, while  as  I  learned  in  the  course  of  an  unsuccessful 
application,  Pennsylvanians  do  not  care  to  have  an 
appointment  go  to  any  other  state. 

Your  proper  course  will  be  to  learn  exactly  what 
persons  to  approach,  thru  Cope,  and  to  send  me  the 
list.  I  shall  then  write  special  letters  of  recommenda- 
tion to  the  more  prominent:  such  as  Weir  Mitchell 
and  Pepper,  who  I  flatter  myself  are  quite  willing 
to  treat  any  recommendations  I  may  give,  thoughtfully. 

Cope  and  the  University  are  certainly  strong  back- 
ing, and  if  you  secure  the  entire  University  influence, 
you  can  scarcely  fail  to  accomplish  your  object.  I 
agree  with  you,  that  you  are  not  in  the  very  best  berth 
at  present,  tho  you  may  recollect  how  anxious  and  ar- 
dent you  were  to  secure  it. 

Should  you  succeed  in  your  application,  which  I 
heartily  wish,  do  not  forget  your  old  friends  at  Chi- 
cago, for  nothing  is  more  appreciated  than  thought- 
fulness  of  old  obligations  and  loyalty,  and  nothing  dis- 
liked more  than  the  dropping  of  persons  after  they 
have  been  utilized.  I  take  the  liberty  of  sajnng  this, 
not  because  I  think  you  could  ever  neglect  the  former, 
or  do  the  latter  wilfully,  but  because  your  mercurial 
spirit  (your  most  malignant  foe)  might  induce  you  to 
look  only  at  the  thing  immediately  in  hand,  to  the  neg 
lect  of  retrospective  regards. 

P.  S.     The  man  you  mentioned  in  your  note  is  con- 


314        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

s.idered  a  fraud  in  Pliiladelphia,  even  by  a  man  he  dedi- 
cated a  work  to. 

In  his  letter  of  July  fifth,  Spitzka  praises  and 
admonishes  his  friend: 

On  reading  over  your  paper  again,  in  the  more  ac- 
cessible shape  of  printed  galleys,  I  must  again  take 
reason  to  express  my  appreciation  of  its  deep  thought- 
fulness.  It  is  exactly  what  our  journal  wanted,  and 
what  all  such  journals  should  have  to  vary  the  dull  rou- 
tine of  case  accounts  and  literature  lists.  I  certainly 
read  it  with  more  pleasure  than  I  am  ordinarily  in  a 
position  to  express. 

In  addition,  I  reflected  thus:  What  a  pity  that  a 
man  who  can  sit  down  and  do  this,  is  perpetually  fly- 
ing about  the  horizon  without  a  fixed  object.  Why 
does  he  not  stick  to  work  which  he  is  so  well  fitted  to 
do,  and  in  which  he  will  accomphsh,  perhaps  lasting 
fame,  if  he  adheres  to  it.'' 

I  put  three  of  your  letters  side  by  side:  one,  in 
which  you  are  willing  to  barter  body  and  soul  to  get  an 
asylum  position,  followed  by  a  second  in  which  you  are 
exuberant  as  to  your  prospects  of  work  and  results 
after  getting  it;  the  third  is  one  in  which  you  express 
yourself  as  impatient  to  leave  it.  I  could  not  help 
thinking  of  Richard  in  Dickens'  Bleak  House. 

I  trust  you  looked  upon  my  refusal  to  put  you  in  the 
ridiculous  position  you  were  bent  on  assuming  before 


Letters  from  Spitzka  815 

the  American  Neurological  Association  with  forgive- 
ness. Read  over  what  you  wrote,  and  imagine  how  it 
would  have  been  received,  then  burn  it,  and  resolve  to 
do  no  more  of  this  fruitless  reform  business.  You  will 
regret  one  of  these  days  every  moment  of  your  life 
which  was  wasted  in  controversy.  Controversy,  if  in- 
dulged in  too  much,  leads  to  an  unhappy  frame  of  mind, 
which  does  not  always  remain  within  the  domain  of 
mere  unhappiness,  but  may  and  often  does  become 
pathological. 

Let  us  soon  have  something  in  the  line  of  your  last 
communication,  or  anything  else  written  in  the  same 
vein. 

After  1884,  we  find  no  letters  until  1890,  when 
Spitzka,  as  president  of  the  American  Neuro- 
logical Association,  urged  Cle^^nger  to  attend 
the  Philadelphia  meeting  and  read  a  paper.  But 
as  there  is  no  reference  to  a  hiatus  in  the  cor- 
respondence, we  must  suppose  that  it  had  con- 
tinued, and  that  the  letters  were  either  destroyed, 
or  were  lost  during  Cle^^nger's  frequent  mov- 
ings.  The  last  letter  in  our  possession  is  dated 
December  twelfth,  1897. 

As  we  write,  there  lies  upon  our  desk  the  skull 
of  a  monkey  which  Spitzka  gave  to  Cleyexger 
in  the  first  year  of  their  friendship.  That  friend- 
ship is  now  ended  forever,  but  the  brain-case  of 


316       The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

that  Cebus  monkey  still  serves  us  as  a  paper- 
weight. Spitzka  never  extracted  Clevenger's 
brain,  for  he  has  preceded  his  elder  friend  to  the 
grave.  One  after  the  other,  Clevenger's  col- 
leagues became  dwellers  of  the  silent  city. 
Spitzka's  son,  the  Edward  Anthony  of  whom 
we  have  already  spoken,  fell  heir  to  the  American 
Anthropometric  Society:  he  examined  and  de- 
scribed the  brains  of  many  of  the  notables  who 
have  figured  in  these  pages — E.  D.  Cope,  Har- 
rison Axlen,  E.  C.  Seguin,  William  Pepper 
and  Joseph  Leidy.  In  the  hands  of  Spitzka's 
son  have  Iain  the  makers  of  American  Science. 


CHAPTER  X 
THE  CLOSING  YEARS 

AS  the  years  swept  on,  taking  strength  and 
friends  from  Clevenger,  he  retired  from 
the  turmoil  of  Chicago  to  the  placidity  of  Park 
Ridge — a  town  about  fifteen  miles  from  the 
whirlpool  where  he  had  lived  so  long.  But 
cruelty  invades  the  village  as  readily  as  the  clam- 
orous city.  The  Clevengers  had  only  to  look 
out  of  their  window  to  see  that  final  proof  of 
man's  brutality — an  ill-treated  orphan.  She  had 
already  reached  maturity,  but  as  the  harsh  atti- 
tude of  her  foster-parents  continued,  the  Clev- 
engers invited  her  to  share  their  cottage.  In 
the  autumn  of  1910,  gastric  carcinoma  wi'ote  the 
death-certificate  of  Mrs  Cle^^nger — after  for- 
ty-six years  of  wedded  life.  A  problem  now  con- 
fronted the  old  doctor  and  his  young  ward,  but 
they  solved  it  by  marrying  each  other — thus  an- 
ticipating the  venerable  John  Allan  Wyeth 
and  the  charming  Miss  Chalifoux. 

317 


318        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

.  The  marriage-institution  is  man's  most  dan- 
gerous invention.  It  wrecks  more  lives  than  al- 
cohol and  ^2iV.  Many  men,  like  Edmund  Wid- 
DOWSON  in  Gissing's  The  Odd  Women,  wait 
thru  half  a  life-time  for  marriage — and  then 
marry  unhappily.  The  shrewdest  cannot  avoid 
its  pitfalls.  Individuals,  artful  and  astute,  who 
can  meet  their  fellows  successfully  on  the  battle- 
fields of  finance,  are  often  unhorsed  in  their  first 
skirmish  with  matrimony.  Yet  Clevenger,  the 
most  unsophisticated  of  men,  twice  entered  the 
marriage-market  with  the  utmost  felicity.  The 
wife  of  his  youth  and  the  wife  of  his  age  have 
been  to  him  an  unalloyed  blessing.  The  first 
Mrs  Clevenger  we  never  met,  but  we  can  tes- 
tify that  nothing  could  be  more  touching  than  the 
tender  devotion  with  which  the  second  Mrs  Clev- 
enger guards  her  old  hero.  If  she  is  to  him  only 
a  child,  she  is  also  his  wife  and  mother.  Clev- 
enger is  a  man  of  many  failures,  but  his  married 
career — beginning  in  his  twenty-first  year  and 
extending  up  to  the  present — has  been  eminently 
successful. 

Clevenger's  numerous  set-backs  could  not 
prevent  him  from  planning  anew,  as  soon  as  he 
was  settled  in  Park  Ridge — he  was  not  the  sort 
of  man  who  could  content  himself  by  raising  a 


The  Closing  Years  319 

garden.  lie  soon  started  the  Park  Ridge  Vo- 
cation School — and  the  prospectus  was  alhiring. 
The  curricidum  of  the  first  year  included  the  es- 
sentials of  typography,  telegraphy,  surveying, 
machinery  and  agriculture.  The  projector 
wrote : 

The  Illinois  Legislature  refused  to  make  any  provi- 
sion for  public  vocation  schools,  so  it  remains  for  in- 
dividuals to  promote  this  good  work  until  woman  suf- 
frage can  direct  public  funds  toward  the  welfare  of  the 
people,  instead  of  in  playing  politics. 

My  school  regards  teaching  as  of  more  importance 
than  buildings,  and  gradually  I  am  finding  superb  ma- 
terial in  the  boys  of  Park  Ridge.  The  readiness  with 
which  young  folks  'pick  up'  knowledge  of  practical 
things,  such  as  wireless  telegraphy  and  mechanism, 
shows  that  learning  can  be  made  pleasant.  Higher 
mathematics,  even,  may  be  taught  indirectly  when  ap- 
plied usefully,  as  in  triangulating  across  streams  in 
surveying.  Some  rudiments  of  chemistry  may  be  taught 
young  children  by  attractive  demonstrations. 

The  listlessness  of  task-tired  boys  in  higher  school- 
grades  changes  to  enthusiasm  in  the  Vocation  School. 
While  the  average  school  is  attended  reluctantly,  the 
trade-learning  rooms  hold  eager,  alert,  interested  work- 
ers, who  come  early  to  stay  long  after  usual  closing 
time.  Only  while  fresh  and  interested  are  my  little 
fellows  allowed  to  work.     Everything  is  voluntary,  and 


320       The  Don  Quiccote  of  Psychiatry 

m}'  experience  is  that  they  never  require  urging.  By 
self-elimination,  those  unsuited  drop  out,  but  some  of 
them  come  back  after  the  play-spasm  is  over.  The 
older  students  take  pride  in  teaching  the  younger,  and 
soon  realize  they  are  headed  in  the  right  direction  for 
usefulness  to  themselves,  their  families  and  the  com- 
munit3^ 

Pupils  considered  dull  or  incapable  have  brightened 
into  attentive,  retentive  students  under  the  Vocation 
System.  Snobbery,  so  rampant  in  the  higher  grades 
of  our  common  schools,  is  wholly  suppressed,  and  the 
*dignity  of  labor'  becomes  more  than  a  mere  phrase. 

My  hope  is  to  gradually  gather  a  force  of  instructed 
boys  who  will  carry  on  the  good  work  when  I  shall  have 
passed  away.  Some  machinery-patents  I  desire  to  put 
in  charge  of  these  graduates,  to  manufacture  for  the 
benefit  of  the  school  'not  built  with  hands,'  but  with 
brains. 

Instruction  first,  materials  afterward.  And  it  Is 
history  that  good  results  in  teaching  are  often  secured 
with  crude  instruments. 

Clevenger  did  not  exaggerate  the  crudeness 
of  his  instruments.  He  located  an  old  press,  and 
with  poor  type,  bad  ink,  and  a  raw  lad  or  two, 
he  proceeded  to  print  some  circulars,  called  Dr 
Clevenger  s  Comments,  which  were  indeed  ter- 
rible to  behold.  All  who  received  them  must 
have  felt  like  mildly  rebuking  their  instigator, 


The  Closing  Years  321 

as  did  RoswELL  Park,  whose  last  letter,  written 
shortly  before  his  lamented  death — another 
friend  gone! — was  as  follows: 

It  is  a  long  time  since  I  have  seen  you,  and  longer 
than  that  has  elapsed  since  hearing  from  you.  I  have 
ofte!i  read,  and  taken  pleasure  in  referring  medical  jur- 
ists, and  otiiers,  to  your  books,  especially  that  on  'liti- 
gation spine.' 

But  I  don't  know  what  to  make  of  this  badly  printed, 
badly  worded,  to  me,  rather  unintelligible  circular.  Is 
it  an  invitation  to  subscribe,  or  what  to  do,  and  with 
what  object.^  I  don't  want  to  waste  your  time,  but  if 
it  be  worth  while,  give  me  some  clearer  notion  of  what 
is  'up'  or  wanted. 

We  need  say  nothing  further  about  the  Park 
Ridge  Vocation  School  except  that  it  caused  its 
founder  a  few  heart-aches,  and  then  went  the 
way  of  his  School  of  Biology. 

Clevenger  was  not  happy  at  Park  Ridge.  He 
had  reached  an  age  when  he  loved  to  be  autobio- 
graphical. Nothing  would  have  pleased  him  bet- 
ter than  to  lean  back  in  the  rocking-chair  on  his 
porch,  and  talk  to  some  sympathetic  visitor  of 
the  days  when  he  browsed  in  Jewell's  library, 
and  investigated  cerebral  pathology,  and  ap- 
peared for  the  defense  in  the  case  of  the  State 
of  Wisconsin  versus  Emma  Herman,  and  was 


322        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

banqueted  by  the  Sheboygan  County  Medical 
Society,  and  helped  organize  the  Chicago  Acad- 
emy of  Medicine,  and  lectured  under  Leidy's 
chairmanship  at  the  Philadelphia  Academy  of 
Natural  Sciences,  and  dined  and  argued  with 
Cope,  and  worked  and  loafed  with  Spitzka. 

But  no  eager  disciples  came  on  a  pilgrimage 
to  the  Sage  of  Park  Ridge.  Nor  did  the  natives 
evince  any  desire  to  listen  to  Clevenger's  recol- 
lections. They  were  interested  in  money,  not  in 
reminiscences.  They  served  no  other  god  but 
wealth,  and  since  Dr  Clevenger  lived  in  a 
wooden  cottage,  while  the  homeopathic  physician 
possessed  a  stone  house,  they  naturally  inferred 
that  the  latter  was  the  better  doctor. 

The  key-note  of  Park  Ridge  is  artificiality. 
Every  tree  is  clipped,  every  hedge  is  trimmed — 
and  so  are  the  inhabitants.  No  birds  seem  to 
nest  there,  and  at  night  we  found  it  difficult  to 
sleep  because  we  missed  the  pleasant  chirp  of 
the  cricket  and  the  song  of  the  tree-frogs.  Yet 
Clevenger  enjoyed  a  certain  celebrity  among 
Park  Ridgians,  but  this  was  due  neither  to  the  re- 
searches he  had  conducted  nor  the  books  he  had 
written,  but  on  account  of  his  relationship  to 
music.  Altho  he  himself  knew  little  of  quad- 
ruple counterpoint,  he  was  known  thruout  Park 


The  Closing  Years  823 

Ridge  as  the  father  of  Martha  Clevenger 
KiMMiT,  the  musical  leader  of  the  town.  To 
bask  in  the  light  of  a  daughter's  accomplish- 
ments is  one  of  life's  supreme  joys,  but  Park 
Ridge  could  not  hold  Clevenger's  gifted  child; 
she  went  West  to  spread  melody  thruout  Wis- 
consin— the  State  in  which  her  father,  years  be- 
fore, as  a  medico-legal  expert,  effected  justice 
for  a  less  fortunate  woman. 

So  Clevenger  waited  in  Park  Ridge,  watch- 
ing himself  sink  into  obscurity.  In  his  prime, 
he  had  his  column  in  such  publications  as  Apple- 
tons  Cyclopedia  of  American  Biography, 
White's  Cyclopedia  of  National  Biography,  and 
Stone's  Biography  of  Eminent  American  Physi- 
cians and  Surgeons,  but  now  he  found  himself 
excluded  from  even  the  all-embracing  Who's 
Who.  Only  at  rare  intervals  he  received  a  cheer- 
ing word,  reminding  him  of  the  tune  when  he 
amounted  to  something:  a  cordial  letter  from 
the  anatomist  Albert  Chauncey  Eyclesh- 
ymer,  the  dean  of  the  medical  school  of  the 
University  of  Illinois,  asking  him  to  come  to 
lunch  for  a  chat  about  the  old  times,  or  a  note 
from  Smith  Ely  Jelliffe,  the  present  proprie- 
tor of  the  Journal  of  Nervous  and  Mental  Dis- 
ease, generously  referring  to  him  as  'one  of  the 


324        The  Don  Qtiirote  of  Psychiatry 

founders  of  the  journal.'  But  as  a  rule  his  box 
in  the  post-office  was  empty,  and  his  visitor's 
chair  unoccupied. 

At  times  Clevenger  looked  thru  the  letters 
he  had  received  from  famous  colleagues,  and  was 
on  the  point  of  burning  them.  None  of  his  chil- 
dren had  followed  scientific  pursuits,  and  when 
he  himself  stepped  down  from  life's  stage,  who 
would  treasure  these  letters  from  Harrison 
Allen  and  Cope  and  Spitzka?  Certainly  no 
one  in  Park  Ridge.  Better  burn  them  in  sor- 
row and  reverence  than  have  them  thrown  away 
by  an  indifferent  hand.  He  took  them  to  the 
fire — then  turned  back  and  carefully  put  them 
away  again. 

He  had  been  a  sociable  man,  a  mixer  with  his 
fellows.  But  he  could  no  longer  attend  meet- 
ings, and  as  his  earning  capacity  was  at  an  end, 
he  could  not  even  subscribe  for  the  medical  and 
scientific  periodicals  which  he  desired.  His 
meagre  pension,  supplemented  by  his  wife's  re- 
sourcefulness, sufficed  to  save  him  from  bodily 
hunger,  but  he  suffered  acutely  from  intellectual 
starvation.  He  must  find  some  one  to  talk  to 
— and  finally  decided  to  return  to  Chicago. 

So  he  came  back  to  the  teeming  city,  hoping 
for  companionship  and  activity.     He  sent  out 


/ 


The  Closing  Years  325 

cards,  announcing  his  readiness  to  receive  pa- 
tients in  his  specialty,  but  other  neurologists  now 
occupied  the  field,  and  no  one  came  to  Dr  Clev- 
enger;  besides,  he  had  no  office,  perhaps  not 
even  a  percussion-hammer.  In  Chicago,  CiiEv- 
ENGER  learnt  the  old  story  that  a  man  may  be  as 
lonely  in  a  metropolis  as  in  a  village.  Every 
day  people  came  to  4321  St  Lawrence  Avenue 
— but  they  knocked  at  other  doors  than  Cleven- 
ger's. 

One  summer,  Clevenger  thought  of  going  to 
Quincy.  The  state's  Old  Soldiers'  Home  is 
there,  and  he  might  meet  some  of  his  old  com- 
rades, and  above  all,  B.  F.  Underavood  was  liv- 
ing in  Quincy,  editing  a  newspaper. 

When  all  the  world  is  old,  lad. 

And  all  the  trees  are  brown ; 
And  all  the  sport  is  stale,  lad. 

And  all  the  wheels  run  down ; 
Creep  home  and  take  your  place  there, 

The  spent  and  maimed  among; 
God  grant  you  find  one  face  there 

You  loved  when  all  was  young. 

So  Cleatenger  wrote  to  Friend  Underwood: 

In  considering  the  possibility  of  my  wife  and  I  com 
ing  to  Quincy  to  live,  an  exceedingly  pleasant  con  in 


326        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

gency  was  in  meeting  you  again  and  renewing  our  sci- 
entific discussions  of  the  times  of  General  Trumbull, 
Prof.  Cope,  Dr  Montgomery,  et  id. — tho  physically, 
I  presume  that  neither  of  us  are  the  sprightly  kids  we 
were  in  those  days  of  the  'Open  Court.' 

Since  the  pubhcation  of  my  Evolution,  which  I  think 
you  reviewed,  I  got  out  some  medical  books  and  one 
entitled  Fun  in  a  Doctor's  Life,  a  copy  of  which  I  or- 
dered sent  to  you. 

You  seem  to  have  liked  Quincy  and  been  appreciated 
there,  and  if  I  do  come  we  can  have  many  a  chat  over 
past  times  of  both  of  us,  and  I  know  that  you  have 
added  to  your  lecturing  and  writing  career  there. 

I  have  only  general  information  of  your  town,  and  its 
soldier  home,  in  the  hospital  of  which  I  thought  of 
seeking  an  appointment. 

If  not  too  much  trespassing  on  your  time,  please  tell 
me  something  of  the  cottages  on  the  home  grounds ; 
are  they  for  one  family  or  more  each.''  and  any  other 
information  an  old  soldier  might  like  to  know.  Is  the 
administration  humane.? 

My  wife  thinks  that  it  would  be  better  for  me  to  go 
down  there  and  see  for  myself.  She  is  quite  timid  about 
the  projected  move,  but  there  are  crises  in  life  when 
decision  is  necessary.   .  .  . 

I  hope  to  hear  from  you  and  see  you  soon. 

But  Friend  Underwood  never  answered 
Clevenger's  letter ;  it  was  returned  to  its  sender 


The  Closing  Years  327 

unopened,  and  across  the  envelope  was  written 
the  word — Deceased. 

Occasionally,  Clevenger  hunted  up  some  of 
his  acquaintances.  During  the  Christmas  sea- 
son of  1913,  he  visited  his  friend  William 
Augustus  Evans,  who  as  health  commissioner 
of  Chicago,  as  professor  of  sanitary  science  in  the 
medical  school  of  Northwestern  University,  and 
as  health  editor  of  the  Chicago  Tribune,  has  be- 
come one  of  the  best-known  of  American  hygien- 
ists.  The  preceding  February,  Dr  Evans  had 
taken  a  trip  to  Denver,  and  on  the  way  he  read 
Pathfinders  in  Medicine.  He  asked  Cle^tenger 
if  he  ever  heard  of  this  book,  and  Clevenger 
said  that  he  had  not.  Thereupon,  Dr  Evans 
loaned  his  copy  to  Clevenger,  who  took  it  home 
with  him.  Cle^^nger  began  to  read  the  volume 
that  night,  and  for  the  first  time  stumbled  across 
the  story  of  Semmelweis.  It  affected  him 
strangely,  for  in  the  fate  of  this  physician  he  read 
an  epitome  of  his  own  thwarted  career.  Unable 
to  sleep,  he  read  the  tale  over  and  over  again, 
alternately  swearing  and  crying.  As  Semmei-- 
WEis  had  been  driven  from  the  Viemia  hospital, 
so  he  too  had  been  cast  out,  by  the  powders  of 
darkness,  from  the  hospitals  of  Dumiing  and 
Kankakee.     Across  the  gulfs  of  time  and  space, 


328        The  Don  Quivote  of  Psychiatry 

Cle^^nger  touched  hands  with  Semmeli^^eis. 
Clea':enger  was  seventy  years  of  age,  but  it  was 
not  until  now,  amid  indignation  and  tears,  that 
he  found  his  hero  ideal.  From  that  time  on,  his 
conversation  and  correspondence  were  tinctured 
with  Semmelw^eis.  Clevenger  wrote  to  the 
Semmelw^eis  essayist — and  thus  found  his  own 
biographer.  When  his  initial  letter  arrived,  how- 
ever, we  knew  nothing  about  Clevenger,  except 
that  we  had  come  across  Clevenger  s  fissure  in 
the  oddest  of  places — in  the  chapter  on  Anatom- 
ical Proper  Names  and  their  Origin^  in  Croth- 
ERS  and  Bice's  Elements  of  Latin. 

Our  friendship  with  Clevenger  began  on  the 
day  that  he  learnt  of  the  death  of  his  life-long 
friend,  Spitzka.  In  his  letter  of  January  fif- 
teenth, 1914,  replying  to  our  note  of  acknowl- 
edgment, Clevenger  wrote : 

Your  .  .  ,  letter  came  to  me  today,  just  as  I  was 
grieving  over  the  announced  death  of  my  old  time  friend 
and  fellow  student  in  cerebral  anatomy  and  psychiatry, 
Dr  E.  C.  Spitzka  of  New  York.  He  had  an  immense 
grasp  of  those  subjects,  and  we  wrote  for  the  Journal 
of  Nervous  and  Mental  Disease  during  the  '80's  as 
well  as  other  scientific  and  medical  journals,  many  ar- 
ticles costing  us  much  time,  thought  and  work. 

Of  late  years  we  have  not  seen  or  corresponded  with 


The  Closing  Years  329 

each  oMicr,  l)iih  when  I  read  of  liis  dcatli  liy  apoplexy 
there  came  the  painful  cramp  at  my.  heart  as  wlien 
during  the  civil  war  I  looked  upon  a  favorite  comrade 
shot  down.  It  seems  as  tho  our  very  enjoyments,  such 
as  in  friendship,  were  made  the  means  by  Nature  to 
increase  our  sufferings. 

Let  US  quote  a  passage  from  another  letter, 
containing  one  of  his  numerous  references  to  his 
newly-found  but  much-beloved  Semmelweis  : 

Here  and  there  if  I  can  find  some  bright  spots  in 
this  gruesome  story  of  mine,  I  shall  rejoice  in  the 
telling,  but  sneak-tJiief  officials,  roystering  drunken 
all-night  revels  of  the  worst  of  Chicago  slum-dwellers 
at  the  asylum,  and  the  finding  out  of  trusted  confiden- 
tial friends  as  treacherous,  predominate.  Full  of  en- 
thusiasm, I  would  instruct  ministers  and  prominent 
merchants  in  the  atrocities,  only  to  find  sermons  filled 
with  meaningless  platitudes,  and  that  the  merchants 
were  in  with  the  grafters  and  with  great  amusement 
disclosed  to  them  my  'fool  reform'  plans.  And  I  won- 
dered that  I  Avas  alwaj^s  butting  stone  walls ! 

Lord,  Lord,  if  I  had  only  known  as  much  as  I  do 
now,  but  none  of  us  can  be  invincible.  I  did  my  best 
and  accomplished  little.  Animosities  originating  at 
that  period  survive  among  the  unscrupulous  and  those 
influenced  by  them.  But  poor  Semmelweis  had  a  simi- 
lar dose,  and  must  have  been  astonished  as  I  was  at 


330       The  Don  Quirote  of  Psychiatry 

the  bitter  injustice  of  it  all.     It's  the  interfering  with 
vested  interests  that  the  world  does  not  forgive. 

When  we  first  met  Dr  Clevenger,  in  the 
spring  of  1914,  we  saw  a  well-preserved,  pleas- 
ant-featured septuagenarian.  He  proved  a  de- 
lightful raconteur,  and  tho  he  sometimes  re- 
peated his  stories,  he  invariabty  told  them  well. 
He  walked  with  a  springy  step,  his  eyes  were 
bright  and  twinkling,  and  his  appearance  gave 
evidence,  that  in  spite  of  the  buffets  of  the  world, 
some  one  was  taking  care  of  him.  In  the  au- 
tumn of  1916,  after  an  absence  of  several  months, 
we  again  saw  Clevenger;  mentally  he  was  still 
alert,  but  the  inroads  of  age  were  visible  upon 
him.  Upon  this  occasion  we  found  a  new  mem- 
ber in  the  Clevenger  household:  Tweety,  the 
sparrow.  In  its  infancy,  it  had  fallen  from  its 
nest  directly  beneath  the  Clevenger  windows, 
and  Mrs  Clevenger  raised  it  with  much  love  and 
many  hemp-seeds.  Tweety  was  not  kept  in  a 
cage,  and  entirely  devoid  of  fear,  it  amused  it- 
self thruout  the  evening  by  flying  from  one  to 
the  other,  looking  into  Mrs  Clevenger's  eyes, 
pecking  at  the  Doctor's  beard,  nestling  under- 
neath our  jacket.  In  its  affection  and  guile- 
less innocence,  it  symbolised  the  pure-hearted 
people  in  whose  home  it  was  chirping  and  fly- 


The  Closing  Years  331 

ing.  We  like  to  retain  this  picture  of  our  dear 
old  Don  Quixote,  resting  peacefully  in  his  com- 
fortable chair,  surrounded  by  his  good  wife  and 
tame  bird. 

Upon  reaching  his  seventy-fifth  birthday,  in 
the  spring  of  1918,  the  veteran's  pension  was  in- 
creased, and  the  Clevengers  moved  from  the 
south  side  to  better  quarters  at  2639  George 
Street,  where  they  live  at  present. 

During  Clevenger's  span  of  years,  neurology 
and  psychiatry  made  more  progress  than  in  all 
previous  periods.  These  twin  sciences  grew  up 
in  the  nineteenth  century,  and  took  strides  only 
in  the  latter  half.  They  are  new  territory  for 
the  scientist,  replete  with  unexplored  regions. 
Ernesto  Lugaro's  Modern  Problems  in  Psychi- 
atry refers  to  several,  but  there  are  myriads  of 
others.  Clevenger  would  have  solved  some  of 
these  riddles  if  he  had  worked  over  them  long 
enough,  but  he  was  a  truant  child  of  neurology, 
w^andering  away  and  getting  lost  in  other  fields, 
when  she  was  about  to  whisper  him  her  choicest 
secrets.  Had  he  been  able  to  follow  Spitzka's 
advice,  his  achievements  in  psychiatry  would  have 
been  greater — but  then  he  would  not  have  been 
its  Don  Quixote. 

Since  no  method  has  yet  been  devised  by  which 


332        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

to  measure  the  relative  greatness  of  men,  it  is 
unprofitable  to  discuss  whether  our  country  has 
produced  neurologists  who  equal  the  French  Du- 
CHENNE,  Charcot,  or  jNIarie;  or  the  German 
Romberg,  Friedreich,  or  Erb;  or  the  English 

GOWERS,     HUGHLINGS     JaCKSON,     or     HORSLEY. 

But  this  much  is  indisputable:  the  labors  of 
American  neurologists  have  materially  advanced 
our  knowledge  of  the  science. 

Leaving  aside  the  earlier  workers,  such  as 
Benjamin  Rush,  Isaac  Ray,  James  Jackson, 
and  John  Kearsley  Mitchell,  we  may  men- 
tion some  of  the  American  achievements  in  this 
department  during  the  past  fifty  years:  in  1869, 
George  Miller  Beard  described  nervous  ex- 
haustion; in  1872,  George  Huntington  de- 
scribed hereditary  chorea;  in  1873,  Hammond 
described  athetosis,  and  Seguin  investigated 
spastic  paraplegia;  in  1876,  Thomas  G.  Mor- 
ton described  metatarsalgia ;  in  1878,  Weir 
Mitchell  described  red  neuralgia;  in  1884, 
MosES  Allen  Starr  showed  that  small  lesions 
in  the  lemniscus  cause  loss  of  muscular  sense  in 
the  limbs  of  the  opposite  side;  in  1885,  Spitzka 
described  the  marginal  tract  of  the  spinal  cord, 
and  Sarah  J.  McNutt  showed  that  the  paraly- 
ses of  infants  were  usually  due  to  hemorrhage 


The  Closing  Years  333 

within  the  cranium;  in  1887,  Charles  L.  Dana 
investigated  the  localisation  of  referred  pains, 
demonstrating  the  areas  of  pain  of  sympathetic 
origin;  in  1890,  William  F.  Milroy  described 
persistent  hereditary  edema  of  the  legs ;  in  1 000, 
Charles  Karsner  Mills  described  unilateral 
progressive  ascending  paralysis;  in  1904,  Henry 
Hun  increased  our  information  concerning 
myasthenia  gravis;  in  1907,  Ramsay  Hunt  de- 
scribed herpetic  inflammation  of  the  geniculate 
ganglia,  and  Ross  Granville  Harrison  devised 
a  method  for  directly  observing  the  living  and 
growing  nerve;  in  1912,  Frederick  Tilney  shed 
light  on  the  histology  of  the  hypophysis  cerebri. 
Burt  G.  Wilder's  discoveries  in  cerebral  anat- 
omy, J.  J.  Putnam's  various  investigations, 
A.  A.  Brill's  popularization  of  Freudism,  Wil- 
liam A.  White's  and  Smith  Ely  Jelliffe's 
editorial  labors,  Flexner's  and  Noguchi's  ex- 
perimentation in  neuro-pathology,  and  Har"s^y 
Cushing's  neuro-surgical  work,  are  contribu- 
tions of  importance. 

What  position  does  Clevenger  occupy  in  this 
list?  Not  as  high  a  place  as  some  of  the  others, 
and  whoever  looks  thru  the  four  official  volumes 
of  the  Institutional  Care  of  the  Insane  in  the 
United  States  and  Canada j  will  find  onlv  inci- 


334        The  Don  Quixote  of  Psychiatry 

dental  mention  of  his  connexion  with  Dunning 
and  Kankakee.  But  the  calm  and  detached 
tones  in  which  these  stately  volumes  talk  of  in- 
stitutional management,  carefully  avoiding  any 
reference  to  political  corruption,  do  not  repre- 
sent the  truth  of  the  situation.  History  cannot 
always  be  written  without  indignation.  And  it 
is  because  Shobal  Vail  Clevenger  has  aroused 
our  indignation  at  atrocities,  continued  until  this 
very  day  against  the  most  helpless  of  human  be- 
ings, that  we  have  passed  weightier  names  by, 
and  have  written  instead  this  story  of  Chicago's 
shame,  thus  contributing  to  medical  history  a 
type  which  we  shall  ever  cherish — the  Don 
Quixote  of  Psychiatry. 


INDEX  OF  SCIENTISTS 


Agassiz,  Alexander,  232 
AK'issIz,  Louis,  51,  232,  272 
Agnew,  Cornelius  R.,  264 
Alexander,  Harriet,  185 
Alexander,  William,  269 
Allen,  Grant,  145 
Allen,    Harrison,    217-224,    229, 

234,  252,  271,  316,  324 
Amadei,  Giuseppe,   166 
Andrews,  Edmund,  40-1,  46 

Babcock,  Robert  H.,  52 
Bache,  Franklin,   189 
Baird,  Spencer  F.,  210,  218, 225 
Bannister,   Henry   M.,   71,   157, 

185,  294,  299,  301 
Barker,  Fordyce,  51 
Bartholow,  Roberts,  157 
Bastin,  Edson  S.,  164-5 
Baxter,  81 
Bayle,   192 

Beard,  George  M.,  155,  168,  332 
Beck,    Theodoric    Romeyn,    48, 

49,  193 
Benedikt,  147 
Bergen,  A.  C,  30 
Bevan,  Arthur  Dean,  185,  260 
Biggs,  Hermann  M.,  273 
Billings,  Frank,  260 
Billings,  John  Shaw,  51 
Brainard,  Daniel,  34-5,  49 
Brewer,  George  E.,  260 
Brill,  A.  A.,  333 


Brewer,  Daniel  R.,  88,  150,  167, 

185 
liutler,  George  F.,  270 
Byford,    William    Heath,    42-3, 

46,  123 

Charcot,  J.  M.,  332 

Chiarugi,  74 

Christopher,  W.  S.,  185 

Church,  Benjamin,  265 

Clark,  Daniel,  47 

Cope,  Edward  Drinker,  109, 
138,  151,  203,  214-16,  224- 
240,  242,  271,  302,  313,  316, 
322,  324,  326 

Corning,  J.  L.,  304-5 

Cramer,   Frank,   162 

Crile,    George    W.,    260 

Crothers,  T.  D.,  183 

Curtis,  Lester,  46,  152 

Cushing,    Harvey,   333 

Cuvier,  Georges,  242 

Dall,   228 

Dana,  Charles  L.,  131,  333 

Dan  forth,  L  N.,  52 

Darwin,  Charles,   128,  139,  153, 

170,  208,  212,  278,  287 
Davis,  Nathan  Smith,  46,  47-55, 

59,  150,  157,  168 
Dean,   Chapman   V.,   120 
Dejerine,  Jules,  112 
Dennis,  F.  S.,  260 


335 


336 


Index  of  Scientists 


Dewey,  G.  M.,  176 
Dewey,  Richard,  107-9 
Dickinson,  Frances,  25 
Dix,  Dorothea  Lynde,  75 
Donaldson,  H.  H.,  112 
Dorsey,  John  Syng,  210 
Drake,  Daniel,  278 
Duchenne,  G.  B.  A.,  332 
Dudley,     Emilius     C,    148-150, 

185,  252,  299,  307 
Duval,  303 

Earl,  Pliny,  75 

Eberle,  John,  13 

Eberth,  Carl,  52 

Ecker,  146 

Ehrenberg,  163 

Elliott,  George  T.,  51 

Elwell,  J.  J.,  282 

Emmet,  Thomas  Addis,  42,  150 

Erb,    Wilhelm    Heinrich,     175, 

332 
Erichsen,  John   Eric,   173-180 
Esquirol,  J.  E.  D.,  75,  82 
Etheridge,  J.   H.,  257-8 
Evans,  John,  49 
Evans,  William  Augustus,   185, 

327 
Eycleshymer,  A.  C,  323 

Fantus,  Bernard,  126 

Fenger,   Christian,  149 

Filhol,  237-8 

Fitz,  Reginald  Heber,  33,  155 

Flagg,  J.  Foster,  217 

Flexner,  S.,  333 

Flint,  Austin,  51 

Forel,  112 

Franklin,   Benjamin,  247 

Friedreich,  N.,  332 


Gage,  Simon  H.,  273 
Gapen,  Clarke,  182 
Garrison,  H.  D.,  164 
Gegenbaur,  Carl,  87 
Geikie,  Archibald,  216 
Gibney,  Virgil  P.,  157 
Gibbs,  Wolcott,  264 
Girard,  Alfred  C,  109-110,  122 
Goethe,  211 

Gould,  George  Milbry,  181 
Gowers,  William  R.,  332 
Gradle,   Henry,  43,  185 
Gray,  Asa,  212,  272 
Gray,  Henry,  36,  288 
Gray,   Langdon   Carter,   157 
Griesinger,  Wilhelm,  75 
Gross,  Samuel  David,  183,  247, 

278 
Gunn,  Moses,  255 

Haeckel,  Ernst,  168,  207 
Hamilton,  Allan  McLane,   102 
Hammond,     Graeme     M.,     267, 

304-5 
Hammond,  William  Alexander, 

46,    131,   152,   263-271,   305, 

332 
Harrison,  Ross  G.,  333 
Hatfield,  Marcus  P.,  46 
Hayden,  F.  V.,  238 
Hayes,  P.  S.,  254 
Hebra,  Ferdinand,  30 
Hektoen,  Ludwig,  185 
Helmholtz,  Hermann,   139 
Henry,  Joseph,  25,  210,  218 
Hill,  Gardner,  75 
Hippocrates,   54 
Holden,  Luther,  30 
Hollister,  John  H.,  39-40,  186 
Horner,  William  E.,  208,210,278 


Index  of  Scientists 


387 


Horsley,  Victor,  332 
Howard,  Iceland  O.,  273 
Howard,  William  Lcc,  270 
Howe,  Delia   K.,  «3,  77-80,  111 
Hughrs,  Charles  Ilaniilton,  1(5.5 
Hun,  Henry,  333 
Hunter,  John,  207 
Huntington,  George,  332 
Huxley,    Thomas    Henry,    229, 

237,  242 
Hyatt,  Alpheus,  228 
Hyde,  James  Nevins,  150,  157, 

252 
HyrtI,  Joseph,  226 

Isham,  Ralph  N.,  39 

Jackson,  James,  332 

Jackson,   Reeves,   128 

Jelliffe,  S.  E.,  323,  333 

Jevons,  163 

Jewell,  James  Stewart,  44-6, 
57,  87,  132,  146,  148,  152, 
157,  168,  282,  289,  294,  296, 
299,  301,  321 

Johnson,  Hosmer  Allen,  46 

Jones,  Samuel  J.,  44 

Jordan,  David  Starr,  273 

Judd,  Herbert,  182 

Kahlbaum,  Karl,  62 

Kiernan,    James    George,    61-2, 

76-77,  101,  157,  182,  185 
Kirkbride,  T.  S.,  238,  312 
Koch,  Robert,  153-4 
Koller,  Charles,  75 
Krohn,  W.  O.,  126 

Lanphear,  Emory,  189  ^ 

LeConte,  Joseph,  162  w 


lA-U\y,  Joseph,  47,   152,  203-17, 

219,  220,  222,  229,  232,  234, 

252,  316,  322 
Lfiickart,  Rudolf,  207 
Lrnf,   A.   H.   P.,  222 
lx)l)dell,    Effie    L.,    Ill,    120-1, 

126 
Lombroso,  Cesar e,  147 
Lugaro,  Ernesto,  331 
Lydston,    George     Frank,    182, 

186 
Lyell,  Charles,  212 
I>yman,  Henry  M.,  88,  181 

McBride,  T.  A.,  157,  301,  304-5 
McClintock,  James,  206 
McMurtrie,  Henry,  218 
McNutt,  Sarah  J.,  332 
McWilliams,  Samuel  Anderson, 

126-7 
Madigan,  M.  J.,  165 
Magendie,  Francois,  208 
Marie,  Pierre,  332 
Marsh,    Othniel     Charles,     184, 

214,  216,  229,  233,  237 
Matas,  R.,  260 
Mayo,  260 
Merriman,  H.  P.,  46 
Meyer,  Adolf,  112 
Meynert,  Theodor,  280-1 
Michels,  John,  137,  156,  307 
Mills,  Charles  K.,  203,  253,  333 
Milne-Edwards,   208 
Milroy,  AVilliam  F.,  333 
Mitchell,  John  K.,  332 
MitcheU,  Silas   Weir,   146,   157, 

270,  313,  332 
Montgomery,      Edmund,      138- 

140,  326 
.Moore,  Edward  Mott,  255 


338 


Index  of  Scientists 


Morgan,  John,  50,  265 
Morton,  Thomas  G.,  332 
Morton,  William  J.,  131-2,  168 
Moyer,  Harold  N.,  182 
Mumford,  James  Gregory,  256 
Miiller,  Johannes,  208 
Murphy,  John  B.,  149,  185 

Nott,  Josiah  Clark,  18,  152,278 
Noguchi,  H.,  333 

Ordronaux,  John,  193 

Osborn,    Henry    Fairfield,    185, 

214 
Osier,  William,  201,  247 
Oswald,  Felix  L.,  138 
Owen,  Richard,  139,  207-8,  223, 


Page,  Herbert  W.,  173,  180 

Paoli,  88,  186 

Park,    Roswell,    36,    152,    254- 

263,  321 
Parkes,  Charles  Theodore,  256-7 
Parkinson,  James,  48 
Patrick,  Hugh  T.,  185 
Pepper,  William,  203,  231,  240- 

254,  313,  316 
Physick,  Philip  Syng,  50,  210 
Pinel,  Philippe,  74,  118 
Pitcher,  Zina,  41 
Powell,  J.  W.,  234 
Pusey,  William  Allen,  185 
Putnam,  J.  J.,  174,  333 
Pyle,  Walter  L.,  181 

Quine,  William  E.,  36,  81,  128 

Ray,  Isaac,  100,  193,  332 
Rea,     Robert     Laughlin,    37-9, 
59 


Reade,  Winwood,  197 
Reese,  John  James,  193 
Register,  Edward  C,  191 
Reil,  Johann  Christian,  75 
Richardson,  Maurice  H.,  260 
Ridlon,  John,  185 
Robinson,  Byron,  126,  256 
Rockwell,  A.  D.,  155 
Rokitansky,  Carl,  30,  40 
Roler,  E.  O.  F.,  43 
Roosa,  D.  B.  S.,    J.,  270-1 
Romberg,  Moritz  H.,  332 
Rush,  Benjamin,  18,  50,  332 

Sachs,  Bernard,  168 
Sachs,  Theodore  B.,  124 
Santee,  Harris  E.,  126 
Schmidt,  H.  D.,  152-4,  252 
Schneider,  Albert,  126 
Seguin,  Edouard,  51 
Seguin,  E.  C,  152,  253,  316 
Semmelweis,  Ignaz  Philipp,  30, 

327,  329 
Senn,  Nicholas,  185 
Servetus,  Michael,  265 
Shippen,  Jr.,  William,  210,  265 
Sims,  J.  Marion,  42,  51,  278 
Skoda,  Josef,  30 

Smith,  Nathan,  47 
Smith,  Theobald,  273 
Spencer,  Herbert,  170,  287 
Spitzka,  Edward  Anthony,  287, 

316 
Spitzka,   Edward   Charles,    112, 
152,  155,  157,  174,  195,  231, 
253,  268,  279-316,  322,  324, 

328,  331-2 

Spray,  John  Campbell,  59-62 
Starr,  M.  A.,  332 
Swammerdam,  Jan,  206 


Index  of  Scientists 


339 


Tait,  Lawson,  43 
Talbot,  Eugene  S.,  185 
Thacher,  James,  50 
Tilney,  F.,  333 
Tonnini,  Silvio,  lfi6 
Tulpius,  Nicholas,  39 

Van  Buren,  W,  H.,  2G4-5 

Walton,  G.  L.,  174 
Ward,  Lester  F.,  138 
Waterhouse,  Benjamin,  60 
Waugh,    William    Francis,    128, 

183-5 
Welch,  W.  H.,  260 


Willie,  W.  A.,  333 

Wiedershcim,  163 

Wilder,    Burt   Green,    146,    157, 

219,   271-80,   287,   299,   301, 

333 
Wilson,  James  Cornelius,  252 
Wistar,  Caspar,  210 
Wood,  Casey  A.,  185 
Wood,  George  B.,  208 
Wood,   Horatio   C,   130,    190-1, 

203 
Wyeth,  John  A.,  316 
Wyman,  Jeffries,  210,  272 

Zoethout,  William  D.,  126 


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